AMERICANISM 


Books  By  David  Jayne  Hill 

A  History  of  Diplomacy  in  the  In- 
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AMERICANISM 

WHAT   IT  IS 


BY 

DAVID  JAYNE  HILL,  LL.D. 

AUTHOB   OF  "the  PEOPLE's  GOVEBNMENT" 


- 

•• 

:•  :  .:!•*•' 

D. 

APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK 

LONDON 

1916 

COPTBIOHT,    1916,   BT 

D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


//  we  would  supplant  the  opmion^  and  policy  of 
our  fathers  in  any  case,  we  should  do  so  upon  evi- 
dence so  conclusive,  and  arguments  so  clear,  that 
even  their  great  authority  fairly  considered  and 
weighed  can/not  stand, 

Abraham  Lincoln. 


Digitized  by  tine  Internet  Arciiive 

in  2007  witii  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


littp://www.arcliive.org/details/americanismwliatiOOIiillricli 


PREFACE 

This  little  book  is  intended  to  set  forth  as 
clearly  as  possible  what  is  most  original  and  dis- 
tinctive in  American  political  conceptions  and 
most  characteristic  of  the  American  spirit. 

The  field  of  thought  here  covered,  no  doubt,  ad- 
mits of  differences  of  opinion  regarding  the  value 
and  importance  of  that  which  is  distinctively 
American;  but  there  can  hardly  be  any  contro- 
versy over  what  it  is. 

It  requires  only  a  brief  employment  of  the 
method  of  exclusion  to  determine  what  it  is  not. 

It  cannot  be  maintained  that  Americanism, 
whatever  it  is,  is  a  matter  of  race.  Our  country 
from  the  beginning  has  been  populated  by  people 
of  widely  different  ethnic  origins.  Some  of  their 
qualities  are  perpetuated  with  practically  little 
effacement,  others  are  obscured  by  the  syncretism 
of  races ;  but  there  is  no  definable  ethnic  type  that 
is  exclusively  entitled  to  be  called  American. 

vii 


PREFACE 

Equally  futile  would  be  the  attempt  to  define 
Americanism  in  terms  of  geography.  There  are, 
it  is  true,  wide  diversities  of  habits,  manners,  cus- 
toms, and  ideas  among  our  people  in  the  various 
States ;  but  there  is  nothing  in  all  these  variations 
that  justifies  a  denial  of  Americanism  to  any  of 
them. 

And  yet  not  every  man  who  lives  in  the  United 
States,  or  who  has  been  born  here,  can  be  classed 
as  an  American,  in  the  sense  which  we  all,  with 
more  or  less  clearness,  attach  to  that  word.  We 
feel  that  we  are  not  misusing  language  when  we 
say  of  a  man  who  entertains  certain  ideas  and  sen- 
timents that  he  is  un-American. 

We  speak  of  "assimilating"  the  new  elements 
that  enter  into  our  population,  and  we  call  it  spe- 
cifically "Americanization."  What  is  it  then  that 
is  involved  in  this  transformation? 

We  have  developed  here  in  America  a  new  esti- 
mate of  human  values,  and  this  has  led  to  a  new 
understanding  of  life.  It  has  become  difficult  for 
us  to  comprehend  the  course  of  events  in  Europe, 
and  it  is  impossible  for  Europe  to  understand  us. 
We  have,  especially  of  late,  imported  many  iso- 
viii 


PREFACE 

lated  European  ideas  into  our  country,  but  they 
do  not  seem  to  fit  into  our  system  of  things. 

The  reason  is  obvious.  Our  fundamental  prin- 
ciples are  different.  They  are  even  contradictory. 
We  have  long  ago  abandoned  a  great  part  of  what 
Europe  still  holds  sacred.  If  we  had  a  dynasty  of 
hereditary  rulers ;  if  we  had  a  State  religion ;  if 
we  had  formed  a  habit,  and  it  had  become  heredi- 
tary, of  giving  ourselves  up  body  and  soul  to  the 
exigencies  of  the  State ;  if  we  were  surrounded  by 
powerful  enemies ;  then  we  might  understand  many 
things  that  happen  in  Europe  which  now  seem  to 
us  unreasonable  and  almost  insensate.  We  some- 
times forget  that  our  earliest  traditions  as  a  peo- 
ple,— and  we  do  not  regard  ourselves  as  any 
longer  young, — were  an  open,  a  heroic,  and  a 
bloody  revolt  against  all  that. 

But  our  Americanism  is  not  a  mere  negation. 
It  is  a  positive,  constructive  force.  It  starts  with 
the  idea,  that  the  human  individual  has  an  intrinsic 
value.  It  holds  that  he  has  an  inherent  right  to 
bring  to  fruition  all  his  native  powers,  and  to  en- 
joy the  fruits  of  his  efforts.  His  real  value  lies 
not  in  what  he  has,  but  in  what  he  is  and  may 

ix 


PREFACE 

become;  and  he  may  become  anything  his  capaci- 
ties and  his  achievements  may  enable  him  to  be. 

This  whole  conception  of  life  is  based  upon  the 
significance  of  the  individual ;  but  the  latest,  if  not 
the  prevailing,  fashion  of  thought  is,  to  speak 
slightingly  of  the  individual, — of  his  rights,  of  his 
capacities,  and  of  his  responsibilities.  We  are  at 
present  seeking  progress,  not  through  a  develop- 
ment of  the  individual,  but  through  what  society 
as  a  whole  can  do  for  itself ;  forgetting  that  society 
is  a  purely  abstract  idea,  possessing  no  inherent 
power  either  of  initiative  or  of  achievement.  Yet 
it  has  become  almost  a  reproach  to  stand  for  the 
rights  of  the  individual,  who  is  the  only  motive 
power  that  society  possesses. 

The  contemporary  reaction  against  American- 
ism erroneously  assumes  that  individualism  is  ego- 
ism. On  the  contrary,  it  is  the  only  solid  founda- 
tion for  our  duty  to  respect  the  other  man's  rights. 
And  this  is  the  essence  of  Americanism  as  revealed 
in  the  history  of  its  origin. 

David  Jayne  Hill. 

Washington,  D.  C 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    THE    AMERICAN    CONCEPTION    OF    THE 

STATE .3 

•  The  Preeminence  of  the  State.  Alleged 
Immunities  of  the  State.  The  Predatory 
Beginnings  of  the  State.  The  Reason  for 
the  State's  Irresponsibility.  •  The  American 
Protest  Against  Mere  Power.  .  A  New  Con- 
ception of  the  State.  The  Essential  Limits 
of  Sovereignty.  The  Distinctive  American 
,  Doctrine.  •  An  American  Contribution  to 
Political  Theory.  The  Renunciation  of  Ar- 
bitrary Power.  •  The  Separation  of  Civil 
and  Religious  Interests.  The  Real  Signifi- 
cance of  the  Constitution.  Hostility  to  Con- 
stitutional Guarantees.  Ill-Considered  Pro- 
posals of  Change.  *  The  Importance  of  the  ' 
American  Example.  •  Essential  Elements  in 
the  American  Conception.  Obstacles  to 
World  Organization.  The  American  Con- 
ception and  the  Future. 

xi 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

II.    THE    CRISIS    IN    AMERICAN    CONSTITU- 
TIONALISM   .......      49 

The  Friends  and  the  Enemies  of  Constitu- 
tionalism. The  Means  of  Guaranteeing 
Equality,  The  Constitution  as  a  Bar  to 
Demagogism.  Constitutional  Changes.  Un- 
constitutional Encroachments.  Unconstitu- 
tional Legislation.  The  Renunciation  of 
Arbitrary  Power.  Results  of  the  Spirit  of 
Domination.  The  Fruits  of  Government  by 
Law.  The  Danger  of  Class  Control.  The 
Attacks  Upon  the  Constitution.  The  Drift 
of  Social  Forces.  The  Needed  Revival  of 
Americanism.  Principles  versus  Personali- 
ties. The  Only  Rock  of  Salvation.  The 
Need  of  Organization. 


III.  TAKING  SOUNDINGS  .  ...»  85 
The  Revolt  Against  Fixed  Principles.  The 
Essential  Permanence  of  Law.  The  Sub- 
stitution of  Experiment  for  Experience. 
Reason  versus  Emotion.  No  Denial  of  Op- 
position to  the  Constitution.  Rights  as  the 
Gift  of  Society.  The  True  Nature  of  Public 
Authority.  The  Nature  of  New  Legislation 
Demanded.  The  Pragmatic  Character  of 
These    Demands.      The    Mask    of    Philan- 

xii 


CONTENTS 

PEE 

thropy.  The  Constitution  Not  a  Class 
Guarantee.  The  Value  of  Constitutional 
Guarantees.  The  Spirit  of  Revolt  Against 
Fundamental   Law.     A  Perilous   Situation. 


IV.  THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY  135 
The  Test  of  Democracy  as  a  Theory.  The 
Real  Problem  of  Government.  Responsibil- 
ity in  a  True  Democracy.  Democracy 
versus  Imperialism.  The  Irresponsibility 
of  Majority  Absolutism.  Just  Government 
Essentially  Self-limiting.  The  Conflict  Be- 
tween Democracy  and  Imperialism.  The 
Strength  of  Imperialism.  Weak  Points  in 
Democracy.  Is  Democracy  an  Impedi- 
ment to  Duty?  Our  Own  Relation  to  Im- 
perialism. The  British  Example.  The 
Democratic  Ideal.  The  Test  of  Our  Own 
Democracy.     The  Triumph  of  Democracy. 


V.  AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS  .  161 
The  Real  Basis  of  International  Law.  Do 
Inherent  National  Rights  Exist?  The  Pos- 
sibility of  World  Organization.  The  Im- 
pediments to  World  Organization.  The 
Present  Basis  of   National  Security.     The 

xiii 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTEE  PAGE 

Necessity  of  National  Strength.  An  Amer- 
ican Platform  of  Principles.  Opposition  to 
American  Principles.  The  League  to  En- 
force Peace.  The  Incompatibility  of  Im- 
perialism and  Democracy.  The  Relation  of 
Peace  to  Justice.  The  Relation  of  Peace  to 
Force.  The  Traditional  American  Attitude. 
The  Fear  of  Militarism. 

VI.  THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE         .     195 

Some  Irrelevant  Propositions.  The  Real 
J  Question  Stated.  Our  Primary  National 
Obligation.  The  Fruits  of  the  New  Politics. 
The  Dominance  of  Economic  Thinking. 
The  Influence  of  Pacifism.  The  Effects  of 
Political  Pacifism.  The  Loss  of  National 
Prestige.  An  Unrecognized  Source  of  Dan- 
ger. Our  First  Line  of  Defense.  Our 
Special  American  Interests.  The  Need  of 
a  Clear  Foreign  Policy.  The  Present  In- 
ternational Problem.  The  Attitude  of  Our 
Young  Men.  The  Necessity  of  National 
Ideals.     The  Nation's  Duty  to  the  Future. 

VII.  NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM  .         .    233 

The  International  Situation.  The  World 
Conflict  for  Trade.     The  Possible  Expan- 

xiv 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAQB 

sion  of  Empire.  The  Alternative  of  World 
Rivalry.  Our  Advantage  of  Position.  The 
Advantage  of  Our  Democracy.  Our  Policy 
Marked  Out  for  Us.  The  Economic  Con- 
test. The  Conditions  of  the  Struggle. 
The  Militarization  of  Industry.  The  Ob- 
stacles to  European  Recuperation.  The 
Question  of  Future  Markets.  Our  Own 
Economic  Situation.  The  Meaning  of  Mili- 
tarizing Industry.  The  Possibilities  of 
American  Initiative.  The  Danger  of  Eco- 
nomic Menace.  The  Industrial  Situation  to 
be  Faced.     The  Opportunity  of  America. 

INDEX 269 


THE  AMERICAN  CONCEPTION 
OF  THE  STATE 


I 

THE  AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

^B^as  the  theory  of  Imperialism  implies, 
tBHRate  were  in  reality  a  superior  entity, 
apart  from  the  individuals  who  compose  it, 
and  this  entity  were  capable  of  foresight, 
supervision,  and  protective  care,  it  would 
not  be  altogether  unreasonable  for  men  to 
submit  themselves  to  it  without  reserve.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  however,  there  is  no  such 
superior  entity.  The  truth  is  that  in  civil- 
ized communities  men  live  under  a  system 
of  relatively  fixed  legalized  relations  which 
we  call  the  State;  but  that  which  gives  us  a 
sense  of  its  reality  is  not  the  State  itself, 
which  is  nowhere  visible,  but  the  Govern- 
ment, or  body  of  men,  which  claims  to  act 
in  its  name. 

3 


'  ■■      AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE  PREEMINENCE  OF  THE  STATE 

We  are  all,  no  doubt,  very  much  imposed 
upon  by  the  alleged  claims  and  authority  of 
the  State,  which  in  the  abstract  are  so  evi- 
dent that  we  do  not  think  of  denying. 
The  noblest  of  human  virtues,  we  ai 
sured,  is  devotion  to  the  State.  It  stands 
for  order  and  justice  among  men.  Without 
it  there  would  be  no  security  for  life  or  prop- 
erty. No  people  is  deserving  of  respect  that 
is  not  ready  to  make  sacrifices  for  the  State ; 
for  it  is  the  State  that  redeems  the  individ- 
ual from  a  merely  animal  existence,  and 
transports  him  from  the  realm  of  mere 
sensual  indulgence  to  the  domain  of  far- 
reaching  historic  action.  At  their  best,  in- 
dividuals are  only  like  the  leaves  of  a  tree. 
They  serve  their  purpose  for  a  season,  and 
then  fall  into  decay.  The  State,  like  the 
tree  itself,  lives  on.    Through  summer  sun- 

4 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

shine  and  wintry  storms  its  roots  penetrate 
to  greater  depths  and  its  branches  rise  to 
greater  heights, — a  symbol  of  unceasing 
growth,  of  continuity  of  purpose,  and  of 
uninterrupted  achievement.  Happy  should 
be  the  leaves  it  has  lifted  to  the  heavens,  to 
fall  and  perish  at  its  feet,  if  they  may  there- 
by supply  it  with  new  nourishment  and  sus- 
tain its  larger  life! 

There  is,  at  first  thought,  something  very 
plausible  about  this  line  of  reasoning.  The 
State,  when  rightly  conceived,  is,  undoubt- 
edly, more  important  than  the  individual; 
and  it  would  seem  conclusive  that,  if  one  or 
the  other  is  to  be  sacrificed,  it  should  not  be 
the  State.  Not  only  the  magnitude  of  the 
interests  guarded  by  it,  but  its  intrinsic 
character  as  the  organ  of  justice,  would 
seem  to  place  its  claims  above  all  else.  But 
can  it  be  contended  that  even  this  high  pre- 
rogative, through  which  the  State  becomes 

5 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

the  custodian  of  our  most  sacred  rights  and 
liberties,  exempts  the  persons  who  represent 
it  from  the  observance  of  the  principles  of 
justice  for  which  it  is  said  to  exist? 


ALLEGED  IMMUNITIES  OF  THE  STATE 

To  the  unsophisticated  man  it  is  inexpli- 
cable that  the  State,  claiming  the  right  of 
command  as  the  guardian  of  human  rights, 
should  not  be  governed  by  the  ordinary  pre- 
cepts of  morality.  He  cannot  understand 
why  it  is  that  what  would  be  condemned  as 
a  crime  if  done  by  an  individual  citizen, 
should  be  made  the  object  of  public  rejoic- 
ing and  national  pride  if  performed  by  a 
government.  "How,"  he  asks,  "can  the 
State  consistently  require  honesty  in  word 
and  deed  of  me,  and  at  the  same  time  not 
only  practice  diplomatic  equivocation  but 
expect  me  to  sacrifice  my  life  in  defending 

6 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

it?  Why  is  it  that  the  State  punishes  me 
with  death  if  I  kill  my  personal  enemy,  who 
has  done  me  a  real  wrong;  and  yet  may  re- 
quire me  to  join  in  killing  innocent  people, 
who  have  injured  no  one,  and  only  pray  to 
be  let  alone?  Why  should  the  State  repress 
and  punish  robbery,  pillage,  and  assassina- 
tion within  its  own  borders ;  and,  at  the  same 
time,  compel  its  subjects  or  citizens  to  aid 
in  the  invasion  and  acquisition  of  territory 
that  does  not  belong  to  it,  and  in  despoiling 
the  property  and  taking  the  lives  of  non- 
combatants  by  exploding  shells  and  falling 
bombs?  In  brief,  what  is  it  that  gives 
a  government  a  right,  without  judge  or 
jury,  without  proof  of  guilt  or  evi- 
dence of  evil  intention,  at  any  time,  for 
any  reason,  or  finally  for  no  reason  at 
all  except  its  own  glory  or  aggrandize- 
ment, to  enjoy  a  monopoly  of  doing  with 
impunity    that    which    all    individual    men 

7 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

are  condemned  and  punished  for  attempt- 
ing? 

As  a  question  of  ethics,  it  is  impossible 
to  justify  a  distinction  between  private  and 
pubhc  morality;  but  it  is  not  primarily  a 
question  of  ethics,  it  is  a  question  of  historic 
fact.  The  privilege  of  employing  airmed 
force  for  any  purpose  it  sees  fit  is  a  tradi- 
tionally recognized  prerogative  of  every 
Sovereign  State;  not  because  thel'e  is  in 
every  free  and  independent  community  of 
men  an  inherent  right  to  treat  with  violence 
every  other  such  community,  but  because  the 
condition  of  human  society  offers  no  method 
of  preventing  a  nation  that  wishes  for  any 
reason  to  make  war  upon  another  from  do- 
ing so,  except  by  a  similar  use  of  armed 
force  against  it.  In  short,  the  only  re- 
straint upon  the  conduct  of  a  Sovereign 
State,  outside  of  its  own  will,  is  armed  force; 
and,  in  an  abstract  sense,  one  State  has  as 

8 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

good  a  right  to  exercise  it  as  another. 
Everything,  therefore,  depends  upon  each 
State's  own  conception  of  its  duty. 


THE    PREDATORY   BEGINNINGS   OF   THE   STATE 

If  we  pause  to  inquire  into  the  origin  of 
the  State,  we  see  that,  in  its  beginnings,  it 
was  not  a  moral  institution,  nor  intended  to 
be  an  or^an  of  justice,  but,  on  the  contrary, 
a  predatory  enterprise,  the  result  of  domi- 
nation from  within  by  a  ruling  class  deriv- 
ing a  benefit  from  the  subjection  of  a  servile 
class,  or  of  domination  from  without  by  the 
invasion  and  conquest  of  territories  and  pop- 
ulations unable  to  resist  the  aggression  of 
the  stronger.  At  first,  all  the  inhabitants 
of  the  conquered  territory  were  destroyed, 
and  its  property  taken  over.  Later,  the 
women  and  children  were  retained  as  slaves. 
Still  later,  the  whole  population  was  spared, 

9 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

but  reduced  to  the  condition  of  a  servile 
class,  and  compelled  to  pay  tribute  to  the 
conqueror.  Such  is  the  history  of  every 
dynastic  State  of  antiquity,  and  the  same 
may  be  said  of  most  of  the  Great  Powers 
which  exist  today.  It  is  only  within  very 
recent  times,  and  chiefly  because  the  com- 
mon people  have  at  last  become  able,  by 
virtue  of  representative  government,  to  with- 
hold the  payment  of  tribute  from  their  rul- 
ers, that  they  have  come  to  be  recognized 
as  constituents  of  the  State,  and  allowed 
some  voice  in  the  government. 

THE    REASON    FOR    THE    STATE'S    IRRESPONSI- 
BILITY 

The  historic  origin  of  the  State  enables 
us  to  understand  its  comparative  irresponsi- 
bility. Based  primarily  on  the  possession 
of  superior  force,  the  absolute  supremacy  of 
the  governing  authority  has  been,  as  a  mat- 
10 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

ter  of  fact^  unquestioned  and  unquestion- 
able. The  unlimited  and  arbitrary  will  of 
the  ruler  has,  therefore,  been  compulsory; 
and  it  has  been  considered  expedient  to  ac- 
cord to  it  a  prompt  and  uncomplaining 
obedience. 

When,  with  the  growth  of  intelligence, 
philosophers  began  to  theorize  about  the 
nature  of  the  State,  they  were  confronted 
by  the  actual  existence  of  absolute  power. 
As  authority  did,  in  fact,  emanate  from  the 
"sovereign,"  the  abstract  attribute  of  "sover- 
eignty," and  not  the  inherent  rights  of  the 
individuals  composing  the  population,  was 
taken  to  represent  the  essence  and  control- 
ling principle  of  the  State;  and  "sover- 
eignty," thus  conceived,  was  defined  as  "su- 
preme power."  Wherever  that  was  to  be 
found,  there  was  the  substance  of  the  State ; 
and,  being  supreme,  it  was  not  only  the 
source  of  law,  but  by  hypothesis  above  the 
11 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

law,  since  it  is  from  "sovereignty"  that  all 
law  proceeds. 

Thus  was  a  temporary  and  abnormal  state 
of  fact  emphasized  and  immortalized  as  a 
legal  conception,  the  one  prime  fountain- 
head  from  which  all  other  legal  conceptions 
were  to  be  deduced;  for  what  in  this  con- 
ception is  the  law,  if  not  a  decree  of  "sover- 
eign power"?  And  what  rights  has  any  in- 
dividual under  the  law,  except  those  that 
supreme  power  accords  to  him?  The  State, 
therefore,  is  everything.  The  "subject" — 
and  the  "citizen,"  too,  under  that  concep- 
tion— is  nothing  but  a  creature  of  the 
State. 

Rightful  authority  and  supreme  power, 
though  in  reality  so  widely  different,  are 
in  this  theory  completely  identified.  "Who- 
ever," declares  this  doctrine,  "possesses  su- 
preme power  has  rightful  authority  to  com- 
mand." If  it  is  the  sovereign's  wiU  to  wage 
12 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

war,  there  is  no  court  of  appeal.  Individual 
rights  and  private  morality  are  entirely  sub- 
ordinate in  this  system. 

THE  AMERICAN  PROTEST  AGAINST  MERE 
POWER 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  first  really 
radical  protest  against  this  conception  of  the 
State  came  from  America,  and  it  is  a  protest 
that  may  very  properly  be  emphasized  to- 
day; not  officially  by  our  Government,  which 
in  recognition  of  the  society  of  Sovereign 
States — if  one  may  use  that  expression  with- 
out derision — is  obliged  to  respect  certain 
international  traditions,  however  erroneous 
and  inconsistent  they  may  be,  but  by  our- 
selves as  individual  citizens,  who,  not  be- 
ing charged  with  that  obligation,  may 
freely  think,  and  freely  express  our 
thoughts. 

When  I  say  the  first  radical  protest  came 
13 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

from  America,  I  speak  with  precision. 
Long  before  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau  wrote 
of  the  "Contrat  Social,"  or  John  Locke  of  a 
"Civil  Compact,"  a  company  of  plain  men, 
sailing  over  wintry  seas  to  an  unknown 
land  with  the  purpose  of  escaping  the  too 
heavy  hand  of  an  absolute  government,  on 
November  11,  1620,  as  they  were  approach- 
ing the  shores  of  what  was  afterward  New 
England,  drew  up  and  signed  in  the  cabin 
of  their  little  ship  a  compact  which  expressed 
a  new  idea  of  human  government.  This 
was  nearly  thirty  years  before  the  famous 
"Agreement  of  the  People"  of  1647,  in 
which  the  followers  of  Cromwell  endeavored 
to  establish  for  the  security  of  their  rights 
against  the  encroachments  of  arbitrary 
power  a  supreme  law  placed  above  the 
power  of  Parliament.  The  compact  writ- 
ten in  the  Mayflower  pledged  the  signers 
not  only  to  frame  for  themselves  "just  and 
14 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

equal  laws,"  but  "to  yield  to  them  all  due 
submission  and  obedience"  Here  was  the 
beginning  of  real  self-government. 

There  was  nothing  original  in  the  mere 
fact  of  a  written  compact,  for  written  com- 
pacts had  long  before  been  extorted  from 
kings  and  emperors  by  popular  uprisings. 
The  new  leaven  was  the  voluntary  submis- 
sion to  self-imposed  law,  as  a  means  of  se- 
curing a  permanent  guarantee  of  individual 
rights. 

No  new  State  was  at  that  time  organized 
on  this  basis,  for  the  Pilgrims  continued  to 
be  loyal  to  the  King  of  England ;  but  a  new 
idea  had  entered  the  minds  of  men,  the  idea 
that  all  just  government  must  be  based  on 
the  recognition  of  individual  rights  and  lib- 
erties, rights  and  liberties  so  sacred  that  even 
governments  are  bound  to  respect  them; 
for  it  is  only  on  account  of  them  that  govern- 
ments have  a  right  to  exist. 
15 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

For  the  first  time  since  Europe  emerged 
from  primitive  savagery,  an  opportunity 
was  offered  for  the  free  exercise  of  intelli- 
gence in  considering  the  fundamental  prob- 
lems of  government,  without  interference  on 
the  part  of  arbitrary  power  and  dynastic 
interests;  for  the  isolation  from  the  Old 
World  was,  in  effect,  a  return  to  a  condition 
of  nature,  so  far  as  government  was  con- 
cerned; while,  at  the  same  time,  in  mental 
development  and  political  experience  the 
colonists  possessed  the  full  maturity  of  the 
age  in  which  they  lived.  The  result  was  a 
new  and  distinctive  conception  of  the  State 
— a  conception  differing  by  the  whole  di- 
ameter of  human  experience  from  that  which 
was  then  generally  accepted  in  other  parts 
of  the  world,  not  excepting  England. 

In  what,  then,  did  that  new  conception 
16 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

consist?  In  migrating  to  the  New  World 
the  men  of  the  colonial  period  brought  with 
them  an  exceptionally  rich  political  inheri- 
tance, the  highest  and  the  noblest  that,  up 
to  that  time,  had  ever  existed.  They  pos- 
sessed the  traditions  of  representative  gov- 
ernment and  the  idea  of  personal  guaran- 
tees contained  in  Magna  Charta,  with  its 
solemn  pledge  that  "No  freeman  shall  be 
taken,  or  imprisoned,  or  be  disseized  of  his 
free  hold,  or  his  liberties,  or  his  free  cus- 
toms, or  be  outlawed,  or  exiled,  or  otherwise 
destroyed,  but  by  the  lawful  judgment  of 
his  peers,  or  by  the  law  of  the  land."  All 
that  had  been  long  before  wrung  from  the 
hand  of  royal  power  as  the  heritage  of  Eng- 
lishmen. In  time  the  later  colonists 
brought  with  them,  and  shared  as  British 
subjects,  the  body  of  principles  vindicated 
in  the  English  Revolution  of  1688,  doctrines 
for  which  Englishmen  had  struggled  heroi- 

3  17 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

cally  before  their  supremacy  was  established 
by  their  triumph  over  the  absolutism  of  the 
Stuart  dynasty.  With  the  writings  of  Rous- 
seau and  the  French  philosophers  only  a  few 
were  acquainted.  With  the  sounder  po- 
litical philosophy  of  John  Locke,  which  in 
its  mode  of  reasoning  was  more  congenial 
to  the  American  understanding,  a  greater 
number  were  familiar.  But  in  their  own 
deepest  convictions,  high  above  the  foothills 
of  mere  theory  and  argumentation,  towered 
like  a  sun-lit  mountain  top  the  self-evident 
truth  that  a  just  government  must  be  based 
on  the  inherent  rights  of  the  governed;  and 
when  that  maxim  was  denied,  not  only  by 
the  King  but  also  by  the  British  Parlia- 
ment, the  moment  for  separation  and  the 
formation  of  a  new  government  had  arrived. 
To  them  it  seemed  preposterous  that  the 
State  could  be  one  thing  and  the  individuals 
composing  it  another.  Equally  clear  to 
18 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

them  was  the  idea  that  individuals,  in  their 
organic  relations  as  a  body  politic,  not  only 
constitute  the  State,  but  the  whole  of  the 
State;  for  what,  in  the  last  analysis,  is  the 
State  but  the  organic  union  of  its  citizens? 
Both  royalty  and  parliamentary  representa- 
tion are  merely  institutions  of  the  State — 
the  King  as  the  symbol  of  its  unity,  the  Par- 
liament as  the  organ  of  its  deliberations — 
but  neither  of  these  is  the  source  of  its  au- 
thority, which  must  be  sought  in  the  body 
politic  itself,  in  the  organic  unity  of  a  co- 
herent people,  associated  together  for  the 
security  of  their  individual  rights. 

THE  ESSENTIAL  LIMITS  OF  SOVEREIGNTY 

What,  then,  in  this  conception  of  the 

State,  is  "sovereignty" — for  the  word  and 

the  idea  were  already  firmly  fixed  in  the 

legal  traditions  of  the  world?    Only  "Sov- 

19 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ereign  States"  could  have  a  standing  in  the 
society  of  nations.  The  new  State  about 
to  be  formed  must,  therefore,  be  in  some 
sense  "sovereign,"  if  it  was  to  be  recognized 
as  independent;  but  the  idea  of  absolute 
sovereignty,  the  unhmited  authority  of  "su- 
preme power,"  that  was  precisely  what  they 
were  opposing;  that  was  what  they  could 
never  accept,  and  consequently  could  not 
claim  for  themselves,  for  the  simple  reason 
that  human  nature  is  not  absolute.  Not 
any  more  than  a  king  could  a  parliament, 
or  even  their  own  colonial  assemblies  in 
which  they  were  represented,  be  allowed  to 
possess  arbitrary  power;  for  there  were  in- 
dividual rights  which  they  meant  to  reserve 
— "inalienable"  rights  as  they  expressed  it — 
which  should  not  be  surrendered  to  any 
earthly  power.  So  far  as  the  laws  of  na- 
tions were  concerned,  they,  as  much  as  any 
others,  were  an  independent  and  a  sover- 
20 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

eign  people;  but  the  right  of  either  men  or 
nations  to  do  whatever  they  pleased,  to  place 
themselves  above  the  law,  or  to  declare  their 
mere  will  to  be  the  law,  seemed  to  them  to 
have  no  warrant.  Such  a  pretension  was,  in 
their  eyes,  mere  usurpation. 

The  true  nature  of  the  State,  they  con- 
sidered, must  be  determined  by  its  end.  In 
this  all  the  colonies  at  the  moment  of  their 
struggle  for  independence  were  in  perfect 
agreement.  What  they  claimed  for  them- 
selves they  cheerfully  accorded  to  all  others, 
even  to  the  least  among  them,  and  on  a 
basis  of  equality.  The  State,  they  believed, 
existed  to  preserve  their  rights  and  liber- 
ties; and  the  Constitution  of  Massachusetts, 
adopted  in  1780  and  never  since  superseded, 
in  even  more  precise  terms  than  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence  distinctly  asserted  in 
its  first  sentence :  "The  end  of  the  existence, 
maintenance,  and  administration  of  govern- 
21 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ment  is  to  furnish  the  individuals  who  com- 
pose the  body  politic  with  the  power  of  en- 
joying, in  safety  and  tranquillity,  their  nat- 
ural rights  and  the  blessings  of  life."  And 
in  the  Declaration  of  Rights  which  consti- 
tutes its  first  article,  it  is  declared:  "All 
men  .  .  .  have  certain  natural,  essential, 
and  inalienable  rights;  among  which  may 
be  reckoned  the  right  of  enjoying  and 
defending  their  lives  and  liberties:  that  of 
acquiring,  possessing,  and  protecting  prop- 
erty; in  fine,  that  of  seeking  and  obtaining 
their  happiness." 

THE    DISTINCTIVE    AMERICAN   DOCTRINE 

The  American  colonies  varied  greatly  in 
their  relations  to  the  British  Crown,  as  well 
as  in  their  religious  ideas  and  their  economic 
interests;  but  all  imited  in  a  definite  con- 
ception of  the  ends  and  purposes  of  the 
22 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

State.  It  existed,  they  thought,  for  the  pro- 
tection of  individual  rights  and  liberties.  All 
alike  shared  in  the  provisions  of  the  Great 
Charter,  which  set  definite  limits  to  the  royal 
authority;  but  the  Great  Charter  permitted 
anything  and  everything  to  be  done,  if  it 
was  by  the  will  of  those  who  made  the  law — 
and  these  were  far  less  than  a  majority  of 
the  people.  The  American  colonists  be- 
lieved that  there  were  things  that  should 
never  be  done,  even  by  the  "law  of  the  land." 
There  were,  they  thought,  hurnan  rights, 
so  individual,  so  necessary  to  be  guarded, 
so  impossible  for  a  God-fearing  man  to  sur- 
render, that  the  Government  had  no  right 
over  them.  Their  contest  was  not  merely 
with  the  King,  but  also  with  the  British 
Parliament.  They  did  not  believe  that  its 
legislation,  if  contrary  to  certain  fundamen- 
tal principles  of  right,  could  possibly  be 
law. 

23 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

The  Stamp  Act  of  1765  was,  in  itself, 
no  great  matter.  It  proposed  to  raise  only 
100,000  pounds  sterling  to  be  used  for  the 
maintenance  of  soldiers  in  America.  In 
Parliament,  Conway  and  Barre  raised  con- 
stitutional objections;  but  it  was  the  elder 
Pitt  who  was  the  great  protagonist  of  Amer- 
ican opposition  to  the  Act.  When  it  was 
passed,  his  health  was  so  broken  that  he 
could  not  hold  a  pen  or  walk  without 
crutches.  When  in  January,  1766,  he  was 
able  to  crawl  into  a  carriage  and  be  car- 
ried into  the  House  of  Commons,  after  re- 
ferring to  the  subject  as  "of  greater  im- 
portance than  ever  engaged  the  attention 
of  this  House!  that  subject  only  excepted, 
when,  near  a  century  ago,  it  was  the  ques- 
tion whether  you  were  to  be  bond  or  free," 
he  declared:  "It  is  my  opinion  that  this 
Kingdom  has  no  right  to  lay  a  tax  upon 
the  colonies."  Then  follows  his  argument, 
24 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

in  which  he  states  that  "the  distinction  be- 
tween legislation  and  taooation  is  necessary 
to  Hberty."  Since  only  the  Commons  have 
power  to  vote  taxes,  and  the  Americans  are 
not  represented  in  Parhament,  he  argues, 
there  exists  no  right  to  tax  them;  and  yet, 
he  affirms,  the  Americans,  being  "subjects'* 
of  Great  Britain,  although  not  taxable  by 
the  British  House  of  Commons  are  subject 
to  the  legislation  of  the  Commons,  the 
Lords,  and  the  Crown,  which  are  equally 
legislative  powers. 

It  is  just  here  that  the  colonists,  and  cer- 
tainly most  Americans  of  today,  while  not 
challenging  the  validity  of  Lord  Chatham's 
interpretation  of  the  British  Constitution, 
would  dissent  from  the  political  theory  that 
underlies  it.  While  taxation  was,  in  the 
War  of  Independence,  the  question  at  issue, 
the  colonists  would  quite  as  stoutly  have 
opposed  an  attempt  by  the  King,  the  Lords, 
25 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

and  the  Commons  to  impose  upon  them 
legislation  affecting  their  civil  and  religious 
liberties.  The  truth  is,  the  American  con- 
ception of  the  State  was  radically  different 
from  the  British  conception.  It  went  far 
beyond  Magna  Charta.  That  provided  that 
specially  enumerated  rights  and  liberties 
should  never  be  taken  away  from  an  Eng- 
lishman "but  by  the  lawful  judgment  of 
his  peers,  or  by  the  law  of  the  land,"  but 
the  American  idea  was  that  there  are  cer- 
tain rights  and  liberties  which  should  never 
be  subject  to  abridgment  by  law,  and  that 
encroachments  upon  these  rights  and  lib- 
erties by  a  portion — even  by  a  majority — 
of  the  people,  or  by  any  government  they 
might  establish,  should  be,  through  a  su- 
perior and  permanent  law,  declared  illegal. 
For  this  there  was  necessary  a  voluntary  re- 
nunciation of  power  in  accordance  with  fixed 
principles  of  justice. 

26 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

AN    AMERICAN    CONTRIBUTION    TO    POLITICAI 
THEORY 

That  is  the  original  and  distinctive  con- 
tribution of  the  American  mind  to  political 
theory.  It  holds  that  there  should  be  noth- 
ing in  government  that  is  not  governed  by 
law.  The  absolutism  of  Parliament  was  as 
odious  as  the  absolutism  of  the  King.  When 
the  American  colonists  set  about  their  con- 
structive work,  their  problem  was  to  de- 
stroy and  prevent  forever  the  recurrence  of 
absolutism  in  every  form,  whether  official  or 
popular,  whether  of  dominant  individuals  or 
of  popular  majorities.  All  alike,  grasping 
for  power,  aiming  to  attain  their  ends  by 
legislation,  they  should  find  themselves  con- 
fronted by  granite  barriers  which  they  could 
not  pass. 

This  idea,  wholly  new  and  distinctive  in 
its  application  to  the  people  themselves,  the 
27 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Americans  embodied  in  their  constitutions. 
Other  nations  had  thrown  off  the  yoke  of 
tyrants,  others  had  won  their  complete  in- 
dependence, others  had  made  it  impossible 
for  a  personal  ruler  to  impose  his  arbitrary 
will;  but  never  before  had  a  people  volun- 
tarily subscribed  to  certain  definite  prin- 
ciples of  right  which  they  bound  themselves 
to  regard,  and  at  the  same  time  made  it  im- 
possible for  themselves  to  abolish  without 
solemn  deliberation  and  a  fresh  appeal  to 
the  whole  people.  Then,  following  the  tra- 
dition of  submitting  to  the  judgment  of  their 
peers,  in  order  to  give  security  to  the  sys- 
tem of  self-government  thus  devised,  they 
instituted  courts  to  maintain  it  by  the  deci- 
sions of  neutral  judges,  with  the  duty  of 
measuring  the  legislation  they  were  required 
to  apply  by  the  restrictions  of  the  funda- 
mental law. 


28 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 
THE   RENUNCIATION   OF   ARBITRARY   POWER 

This  system  of  voluntary  renunciation  of 
arbitrary  power  was  no  man's  personal  in- 
vention, nor  was  it  a  deduction  from  any 
form  of  political  theory.  It  was  simply  the 
result  of  experience  and  the  application  of 
common  knowledge.  The  colonists  had  suf- 
fered from  the  imposition  of  obnoxious  laws, 
and  they  were  accustomed  to  read  their  civil 
guarantees  in  their  written  charters.  What, 
then,  was  more  natural  than  that,  without 
speculation  regarding  new  theories  of  the 
State,  they  should  spontaneously  combine 
their  urgent  needs  with  their  established  cus- 
toms, and  produce  the  first  written  constitu- 
tions which  the  world  had  known? 

As  an  aid  to  the  complete  suppression  of 

absolutism,  the  people  of  Massachusetts,  in 

their    State    Constitution,    adopted    from 

Montesquieu,  with  unprecedented  explicit- 

29 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ness,  the  idea  of  the  separation  and  distribu- 
tion of  powers.  "In  the  government  of  this 
Commonwealth,"  runs  the  text  of  this  docu- 
ment, "the  legislative  department  shall 
never  exercise  the  executive  and  judicial 
powers,  or  either  of  them ;  the  executive  shall 
never  exercise  the  legislative  and  judicial 
powers,  or  either  of  them;  the  judicial  shall 
never  exercise  the  legislative  and  executive 
powers,  or  either  of  them ;  to  the  end  that  it 
may  be  a  government  of  laws  and  not  of 
men"  Thus  explicitly  the  fundamental 
law  was  hedged  about  with  a  triple  security, 
each  department  of  government  being  pow- 
erless for  great  harm  without  the  conniv- 
ance of  the  others,  and  each  being  made  the 
guardian  of  its  own  sphere  of  action. 

THE    SEPARATION    OF    CIVIL    AND    RELIGIOUS 
INTERESTS 

But  a  still  more  radical  departure  from 
British  and  general  usage  at  that  time  was 
30 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

the  complete  separation  of  civil  and  re- 
ligious interests.  Intolerance  in  matters  of 
religion,  even  in  the  colonies,  had  been  the 
rule.  In  no  sphere  of  human  relations  had 
absolutism  been  more  tenacious  and  persist- 
ent in  enforcing  unity  of  opinion.  The  ad- 
vantage of  being  able  to  influence  men 
through  their  religious  sentiments  had  never 
been  neglected  by  any  great  autocratic  ruler, 
and  political  power  from  the  days  of  the 
Roman  Empire  had  endeavored  to  use  re- 
ligion as  an  instrument  for  imposing  central 
authority.  On  the  other  hand,  religion,  bow- 
ing in  reverence  before  a  sovereignty  su- 
perior to  the  authority  of  the  State,  had 
often  been  in  revolt  against  its  arbitrary 
rule.  But  how  could  a  conception  of  the 
State  founded  on  the  inherent  rights  of  the 
individual  suppress  or  neglect  the  most  sa- 
cred right  of  all?  Accordingly,  it  was  to 
America  that  "belongs  the  glory  of  having 
31 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

founded  the  first  modern  State  which  was 
really  tolerant,  based  on  the  principle  of 
taking  the  control  of  religious  matters  en- 
tirely out  of  the  civil  government";  and 
when  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States 
was  adopted,  it  was  ordained  that  Congress 
could  not  make  any  law  respecting  the  es- 
tablishment of  a  religion,  or  interfering  with 
the  right  of  religious  worship. 

THE    REAL    SIGNIFICANCE    OF    THE 
CONSTITUTION 

We  might  here  speak  of  other  guaran- 
teed personal  rights,  which  even  the  Gov- 
ernment itself  has  no  power  to  take  away; 
but  it  is  sufficient  to  point  out  that  it  is  in 
the  National  Constitution  that  these  rights 
have  their  only  permanent  security. 

It  is,  therefore,  of  supreme  importance 
that  every  American  citizen  should  compre- 
hend the  real  and  distinctive  significance  of 
32 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

the  American  Constitution.  It  does  not  lie 
mainly  in  the  frame  of  government  and  the 
mechanism  of  administration,  but  in  the 
guarantee  of  individual  rights  and  liberties. 
The  doctrine  of  the  French  Revolution,  bor- 
rowed from  Rousseau,  that  the  will  of  the 
people  is  absolute,  and  that  any  law  desired 
by  the  majority  is  acceptable,  was  not  a 
doctrine  of  the  American  Revolution;  and 
it  has  never  been  entertained  in  the  United 
States  by  any  considerable  body  of  thought- 
ful men.* 

On  the  contrary,  the  doctrine  of  the  Con- 
stitution is  that  the  human  individual  pos- 
sesses certain  inherent  rights,  including  the 
security  of  life  and  liberty,  and  the  preroga- 
tive of  acquiring,  possessing,  and  enjoying 

*  For  a  detailed  discussion  of  the  difference  be- 
tween the  principles  of  the  American  and  the  French 
revolutions,  see  the  author's  "The  People's  Govern- 
ment," pp.  41,  43,  106,  114. 

4  33 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

property,  and  that  no  government,  however 
constituted,  may  justly  take  them  away,  or 
pass  other  than  **just  and  equal  laws,"  which 
apply  to  all  citizens  alike,  without  distinc- 
tion of  race,  class,  or  place  of  residence. 


HOSTILITY  TO   CONSTITUTIONAL  GUARANTEES 

That  a  system  like  this  should  in  time 
meet  with  opposition  is  not  unnatural.  The 
egoistic  impulses  of  human  nature,  which  it 
is  intended  to  check  and  frustrate,  always 
have  been,  and  always  will  be,  hostile  to  it. 
Individuals  and  classes  who  desire  to  domi- 
nate, and  demagogues  who  wish  to  rise  to 
power  by  appealing  to  the  sordid  interests 
of  a  numerical  majority,  regardless  of  mi- 
nority rights,  may  be  expected  to  use  every 
means  to  break  down  the  constitutional  ob- 
structions to  their  designs ;  and  for  that  pur- 
pose make  it  an  easy  matter  to  destroy,  one 
34 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

by  one,  through  constitutional  amendments, 
the  existing  guarantees. 

There  is  always  a  tendency  on  the  part 
of  those  who  control,  or  expect  to  control, 
a  government,  to  represent  the  State  as  a 
kind  of  independent  and  authoritative  en- 
tity which  possesses  an  unlimited  power  over 
the  citizen.  Men  who  would  not  have  the 
insolence  as  individuals  to  demand  of  the 
more  fortunate  an  equal  partition  of  their 
possessions  for  their  own  benefit,  have  the 
impertinence  to  affirm  that  the  State,  as  a 
supreme  authority,  should  demand  the  sur- 
render to  itself  of  all  private  property,  in 
order  that  it  may  reapportion  it  in  its  own 
way.  This  is  a  new  and  subtle  form  of  abso- 
lutism not  less  despotic  than  the  royal  pre- 
tensions which  Democracy  has  resisted.  Au- 
thoritative Democracy  is,  in  truth,  as  capa- 
ble of  arbitrary  action,  and  of  a  total  disre- 
gard of  the  rights  of  minorities,  as  any  other 
35 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

form  of  autocratic  government ;  and  with  us, 
where  monarchy  is,  of  course,  wholly  out 
of  the  question,  it  is  the  one  ever-present 
danger  against  which  we  need  to  guard. 
The  distinctive  feature  of  the  American  con- 
ception of  public  authority  is  that  unlimited 
power  should  be  accorded  to  no  branch  of 
government,  and  not  even  to  a  majority  of 
the  people.  It  was  precisely  the  "tyranny 
of  majorities"  that  the  founders  of  our 
republic  most  feared,  and  it  was  the  in- 
herent rights  of  the  individual  which  they 
meant  to  preserve.  They  did  not  intend, 
after  escaping  from  the  arbitrary  rule  of 
the  British  Parliament,  to  jeopardize  their 
liberties  by  creating  another  arbitrary  gov- 
ernment. 

ILL-CONSIDERED  PROPOSALS  OF  CHANGE 

Now  that  the  Constitution  has  borne  its 
fruits,  and  has  made  us  a  free,  united,  and 
36 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

prosperous  nation,  composed  of  forty-eight 
self-governed  States — the  most  important 
area  of  absolutely  free  intercourse  in  the 
world — bound  together  by  a  single  funda- 
mental law,  under  the  jurisdiction  of  a  Su- 
preme Court,  we  are  able  to  estimate  how 
great  should  be  our  appreciation  of  this 
system. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  state  or  to  answer 
here  the  reasons  offered  by  a  new  generation 
of  theorists  for  changing  our  form  of  gov- 
ernment; but  I  venture  the  assertion  that 
the  ends  contemplated  by  some  of  them  are 
not  compatible  with  what  is  historically  the 
American  conception  of  the  State,  and  that 
they  involve  a  complete  repudiation  of  that 
"Americanism"  which  has  been  described. 
What  conflicts  of  opinion  upon  this  subject 
may  yet  arise,  I  do  not  know;  but  I  appre- 
hend that  we  have  entered  upon  a  period 
when,  if  it  is  to  be  prolonged,  all  that  is 
37 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

distinctively  American  will  be  compelled  to 
defend  itself  against  very  insidious  and  very 
persistent  attacks  that  will  appeal  to  pas- 
sions and  interests  which  may  seriously  en- 
danger our  political  traditions. 

It  is  peculiarly  unfortunate,  at  a  time 
like  the  present,  when  the  acceptance  of 
just  principles  is  vastly  important,  not  only 
to  the  peace  and  order  of  our  own  country, 
but  to  the  union  of  all  nations  upon  some 
common  ground,  that  new  conflicts  regard- 
ing the  fundamental  principles  of  justice 
should  arise,  that  the  authority  of  the  courts 
and  the  value  of  the  judicial  system  should 
be  called  in  question,  and  that  the  whole 
conception  of  social  relations  should  be 
thrown  into  the  melting  pot ;  for  it  has  been 
thought  by  many,  and  has  been  hoped  by 
a  still  greater  number,  that  the  American 
conception  of  the  State,  yielding  authority 
to  great  principles  of  equity  and  to  the  rule 
38 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

of  just  and  equal  laws,  might  afford  a  basis 
for  the  reorganization  of  the  family  of  na- 
tions, now  torn  by  so  many  dissensions  and 
plunged  into  a  maelstrom  of  deadly  con- 
flict. 

THE   IMPORTANCE  OF  THE  AMERICAN 
EXAMPLE 

In  some  respects  our  example  as  a  nation 
has  proved  of  great  value  to  the  world.  As 
Edmund  Burke  said,  it  has  taught  England 
how  to  treat  her  colonies,  by  according  free- 
dom and  security  to  the  individual  under 
just  and  equal  laws.  Even  at  the  time  of 
our  great  struggle  for  individual  rights, 
Lord  Chatham  declared:  "If  America 
should  fall,  she  would  fall  like  the  strong 
man  Samson;  she  would  embrace  the  pillars 
of  the  State,  and  pull  down  the  whole  struc- 
ture with  her." 

The  American  conception  of  the  State 
39 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

has  been  contested  at  every  point,  but  it  has 
thus  far  stood  the  tests  that  have  been  ap- 
plied to  it.  It  has  furnished  a  fruitful  ex- 
ample to  other  nations,  and  it  is  not  too 
much  to  say  that  its  development  has  created 
a  new  era  in  the  history  of  the  world;  and 
yet  the  system  into  which  it  has  grown  has 
never  been  adopted  in  its  totality  by  any 
other  people.  Other  nations  also  are  liv- 
ing under  written  constitutions,  but  in  their 
attempts  to  imitate  our  system  they  have 
neglected  to  adopt  the  two  really  original 
and  distinctive  features  of  it,  namely,  our 
renunciation  of  the  absolute  power  of  ma- 
jorities over  individual  rights  and  liberties, 
and  our  idea  of  judicial  authority  as  a  means 
of  preventing  the  overthrow  of  constitu- 
tional guarantees  by  mere  majority  legisla- 
tion. The  result  has  been  that  in  rendering 
the  legislative  power  theoretically  omnip- 
otent, without  retaining  the  balancing  ef- 
40 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

feet  of  the  judieiary,  the  imitators  of  the 
American  system  have  made  it  possible  for 
a  faction,  or  even  a  single  executive,  to  exer- 
cise a  despotic  domination;  thus  entailing 
frequent  governmental  changes  and  per- 
sonal dictatorships. 

ESSENTIAL  ELEMENTS  IN  THE  AMERICAN 
CONCEPTION 

But,  in  truth,  success  cannot  be  expected 
from  any  system  of  government  unless  the 
individuals  who  compose  the  State  entertain 
respect  for  the  personal  rights  and  liberties 
of  all.  The  moment  a  disposition  prevails 
to  deny  these,  or  to  impose  a  dominant  will 
upon  the  community,  the  system  of  guaran- 
tees is  undermined;  and  it  is  in  its  guaran- 
tees of  personal  liberty  that  the  American 
conception  consists.  Local  autonomy  in  all 
local  matters,  popular  representation  in 
State  and  National  affairs,  the  federation 
41 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

of  independent  communities,  a  body  of  un- 
alterable principles  accepted  in  a  funda- 
mental law,  judicial  decision  in  the  settle- 
ment of  differences — these  are  essential  ele- 
ments in  the  American  conception  of  the 
State. 

Can  we  maintain  it?  And  can  we  hope 
that  it  may  furnish  suggestions  for  the 
peaceful  organization  of  other  nations  and 
groups  of  nations? 

In  time,  perhaps,  the  example  of  the 
American  Union,  if  it  continues  to  accom- 
plish the  purposes  for  which  it  was  designed ; 
if  in  spite  of  disruptive  and  disintegrating 
tendencies  it  shows  by  its  stability,  unity, 
coherence,  and  loyalty  to  just  principles 
embodied  in  a  fundamental  law,  that  it  can 
endure,  it  may  produce  the  conviction  that 
here  is,  in  fact,  the  solution  of  the  problem 
of  a  just,  pacific,  and  effective  world  organ- 
ization. 

42 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 
OBSTACLES  TO  WORLD  ORGANIZATION 

But  even  if  that  conviction  should  become 
general,  there  will  still  remain  the  dynastic 
interests,  the  racial  antagonisms,  the  tradi- 
tional hostilities,  the  bitter  memories,  the 
industrial  and  commercial  rivalries,  and, 
worst  of  all,  the  mutual  fear  and  distrust  of 
the  nations,  which  have  written  such  a  san- 
guinary and  humiliating  commentary  on  the 
perversity  and  blindness  of  human  nature, 
and  revealed  the  terrific  struggle  necessary 
to  maintain  a  national  existence  in  their 
presence. 

Until  a  conception  of  the  nature,  the  end, 
the  authority,  and  the  limits  of  the  State, 
different  from  that  which  seems  to  be  mani- 
fested in  the  conflict  which  is  now  agoniz- 
ing the  world,  prevails,  there  will  inev- 
itably linger  in  our  minds  an  undertone 
of  sadness,  of  doubt,  and  of  deep  distress, 
43 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

as  we  contemplate  the  future  of  mankind. 
It  is  only  as  men  are  able  and  willing  to 
adopt  fundamental  principles  of  justice,  of 
equity,  of  moderation,  and  of  self-restraint ; 
to  abide  by  them,  to  reverence  them,  to  love 
them,  and  to  be  prepared,  if  necessary,  to 
die  for  them,  that  any  light  falls  upon  that 
shadowed  pathway. 

THE  AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  AND  THE  FUTURE 

It  is  not  a  time  for  pride,  exultation, 
and  self-glorification,  that  we  are  Ameri- 
cans. Least  of  all  is  it  a  time  for  self- 
righteousness  or  for  dogmatic  utterances. 
It  is  rather  a  time  for  gratitude  and  thank- 
fulness that,  in  shaping  the  form  of  our 
government,  in  securing  firm  guarantees 
of  our  inherent  rights,  in  establishing  the 
traditions  of  our  people,  our  fathers  builded 
more  wisely  than  they  knew,  in  placing  the 
44 


AMERICAN  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

emphasis  upon  the  happiness  and  security 
of  the  Citizen,  and  not  upon  the  power  and 
glory  of  the  State. 

Into  this  heritage  has  passed  the  best  re- 
sults of  human  experience;  but  there  has 
passed  also  a  spirit  of  devotion  to  ideals 
that  had  never  before  been  realized;  a  faith 
in  the  possibilities  of  man  based  on  faith 
in  a  Creative  Power  working  in  the  world. 
The  end  is  not  yet.  There  is  still  uplifting 
power  in  a  faith  like  that  of  our  fathers. 

The  stars  indeed  are  old,  but  life  is  young. 
That  in  Earth's  ruddy  morningtime  first 

sung 
Its  salutation  to  the  radiant  dawn; 
The  yesterday  of  life  seems  hardly  gone. 

So  new  is  Man's  still  unrecorded  day, 
Whose  noon  is  yet,  perchance,  so  far  away 
That  his  endeavors,  only  just  begun. 
May  change  the  scene  before  the  setting  sun. 
45 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

No  past,  but  some  far  future,  holds  the  key- 
To  that  firm  door  that  bars  eternity; 
Its  secrets  sleep  in  aims  still  unfulfilled, 
In  deeds  undone,  but  yet  not  all  unwilled. 

So  turn  we  once  again  to  our  rude  task; 
A  little  more  of  life  is  all  we  ask; 
Spread  all  the  canvas,  every  sail  unfurled, 
To  help  complete  this  stiU  unfinished  world! 


II 

THE  CRISIS  IN  AMERICAN 
CONSTITUTIONALISM 


II 

THE  CRISIS  IN  AMERICAN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

The  severest  test  which  the  American  con- 
ception of  the  State  has  ever  been  called 
upon  to  endure  was  occasioned  by  circum- 
stances connected  with  the  Civil  War,  but 
it  did  not  involve  a  denial  of  the  funda- 
mental principles  upon  which  American 
constitutionalism  is  based.  It  consisted,  on 
the  contrary,  merely  in  a  difference  of  docu- 
mentary interpretation.  Had  the  Federal 
Constitution  produced  a  nation,  or  only  a 
confederation?  That  was  the  question  upon 
which  the  North  and  the  South  disagreed. 

At  present,  however,  we  are  confronted 
by  a  different  and  a  far  more  radical  ques- 
tion, namely :  Does  the  American  conception 
of  the  State  embody  the  best  principles  of 
5  49 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

government,  or  are  we  to  look  for  others? 

Thoughtful  men  in  all  countries  are,  no 
doubt,  generally  united  in  the  conviction 
that  constitutional  government,  in  some 
form,  is  desirable,  and  embodies  the  most 
perfect  method  of  regulating  human  affairs 
ever  conceived  by  man. 

With  regard  to  the  attainability  and  per- 
manence of  this  ideal,  however,  opinions  dif- 
fer widely.  Most  men  agree  that  certain 
peoples  are  not  ripe  for  it.  Others  con- 
sider it  necessary  to  combine  with  it  some 
vestige  of  absolutism,  as  a  means  of  rescu- 
ing society  from  the  anarchy  that  would 
follow  upon  its  possible  failure.  Still  others 
openly  oppose  it,  because,  for  various  rea- 
sons, it  is  their  personal  interest  to  do  so. 

THE    FRIENDS    AND    THE    ENEMIES    OF 
CONSTITUTIONALISM 

The  dangers  to  the  American  conception 
of  constitutional  government  do  not  arise 
50 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

from  the  open  opposition  of  its  enemies,  for 
in  the  field  of  free  debate  it  is  abundantly 
able  to  defend  itself.  Its  real  foes — and 
they  are  not  a  few — are  those  who  do  not 
avowedly  attack  or  resist  it;  but  who,  while 
professing  to  be  its  friends,  and  even  its 
advocates,  secretly  repudiate  or  intention- 
ally pervert  its  fundamental  principles. 

In  contrast  with  the  political  absolutism 
which  it  was  intended  to  destroy,  and  which 
it  has  endeavored  to  supersede,  American 
constitutional  government  is  based  upon  the 
principle  of  equal  guarantees  for  the  rights 
of  all  citizens,  without  distinction  of  per- 
sons or  classes,  under  the  protection  of  co- 
ordinate and  distributed  powers,  exercised 
by  public  officers  freely  chosen  by  the  peo- 
ple, and  revocable  after  fixed  periods  of 
office.  Recognizing  life,  personal  liberty, 
and  property  as  elements  of  inalienable 
right,  the  American  system  of  government 
51 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

aims  to  ^ard  these  from  every  form  of 
violation. 

The  mere  statement  of  the  meaning  of 
that  system  plainly  indicates  who  are  its 
natural  enemies.  These  include  all  those 
who,  in  any  form  whatever,  desire  to  make 
the  State  their  private  servant,  and  through 
control  of  the  public  powers  use  it  to  serve 
their  own  personal  or  class  interests  at  the 
expense  of  others. 

The  division  of  men  into  friends  and  ene- 
mies of  the  American  idea  of  constitutional 
government  is  based  upon  the  attitude  they 
assume  toward  its  fundamental  principle. 
This  principle  being  the  existence  of  equal 
and  adequate  guarantees,  by  which  the  life, 
the  personal  liberty,  and  the  property  of 
every  citizen  are  rendered  inviolate, 
every  person  and  every  organization  that 
aims  by  means  of  exceptional  legislation  to 
secure  special  advantages  to  the  detriment 
52 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

of  others  must  be  classed  as  an  enemy  of 
the  American  system,  which — although  not 
a  guarantee  of  equal  conditions,  which  is 
impossible — is  essentially  a  guarantee  of 
equal  rights. 


THE  MEANS  OF  GUARANTEEING  EQUALITY 

The  means  by  which  the  fathers  of  con- 
stitutional government  in  the  United  States 
intended  to  obtain  and  perpetuate  this  guar- 
antee were  threefold: 

First  of  all,  the  "inalienable  rights"  of  all 
citizens  were  to  be  secured  by  a  fundamental 
law  which  placed  them  beyond  the  reach  of 
unequal  legislation  or  executive  violence. 
What  the  American  colonists  had  suffered 
from  was  the  exercise  of  absolute  and  arbi- 
trary authority.  This  they  intended  to  end ; 
and,  in  order  to  do  so,  thej^  aimed  to  place 
the  opportunity  of  encroachment  upon  cer- 

5a 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

tain  personal  rights  permanently  beyond  the 
power  of  all  legislatures  and  executives.  In 
brief,  legislative  bodies  and  executive  of- 
ficers were  themselves  made  subject  to  the 
restrictions  of  law;  and  no  man  was  to  be 
judged  except  in  accordance  with  it.  Life, 
liberty,  and  property  were  not  to  be  taken 
away  without  a  day  in  court,  in  the  presence 
of  responsible  authorities  acting  under  the 
obligations  of  equal  laws. 

The  second  security  afforded  was  a  form 
of  government  in  which  public  powers  were 
so  distributed  that  no  public  officer  could 
commit  an  act  of  oppression  without  render- 
ing himself  responsible  for  his  action.  The 
people,  through  their  representatives,  could 
make  new  laws;  but  even  the  people  could 
make  no  laws  which  encroached  upon  the 
rights  already  sacredly  guarded  by  the  fun- 
damental law.  The  executive  was  to  see 
that  the  law  was  executed,  but  he  himself 
54 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

was  bound  by  it  and  could  act  only  in  ac- 
cordance with  it.  The  judiciary  was  to  de- 
cide what  the  law  is,  but  it  also  was  obliged 
to  respect  and  maintain  the  guarantees 
which  the  fundamental  law  provided. 

Finally,  the  people,  standing  in  the  place 
of  the  sovereign,  and  exercising  sovereign 
power,  did  what  no  other  sovereign  had  ever 
before  voluntarily  done  in  the  history  of 
the  world^they  freely  and  formally  re- 
nounced the  power  to  impose  their  personal 
arbitrary  will  upon  the  organs  of  govern- 
ment or  upon  one  another.  They  confided 
to  the  operation  of  the  system  they  had  de- 
vised and  created  the  legislative,  executive, 
and  judicial  functions  necessary  to  the  ap- 
plication of  justice,  subject  to  their  ap- 
proval or  reprobation  by  means  already  pro- 
vided for  in  that  system. 

Thus  absolutism  in  every  form  was  in- 
tended to  be  excluded  from  government, 
55 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

which  aimed  to  be  a  system  of  just  laws  and 
principles  in  place  of  mere  arbitrary  will 
actuated  by  caprice,  prejudice,  malignity, 
or  self-interest. 

It  is  easy  to  see  how  this  system  could 
be  covertly  attacked  by  those  who,  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously,  were  inspired  by 
motives  for  subverting  it. 

THE  CONSTITUTION  AS  A  BAR  TO  DEMAGOGISM 

The  first  method  of  attack  is  through  the 
hasty  alteration  of  the  fundamental  law  it- 
self. Believing  in  the  approximate  perfec- 
tion of  our  system,  the  people  of  the  United 
States  have,  in  general,  desired  to  maintain 
the  stability  of  the  Constitution,  and  so  far 
it  has  been  subjected  to  very  little  change. 
Being  essentially  a  restriction  of  arbitrary 
power,  it  presents  a  firm  barrier  to  the  aims 
of  those  who  seek  to  derive  private  advan- 
56 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

tage  through  the  control  of  the  State.  As 
long  as  it  remains  intact  there  exists  a  legal 
obstacle  to  depredation.  No  mere  dema- 
gogue ever  has  loved,  or  ever  will  love,  the 
Constitution;  for  it  is  a  restraint  upon  per- 
sonal ambition  and  personal  interests.  He 
would  much  prefer  to  substitute  for  it  the 
unrestrained  "will  of  the  people,"  by  which 
he  understands  assent  to  his  own  proposals. 
With  seductive  simplicity  he  blandly  asks, 
"What  is  the  Constitution  between  friends  ?" 
The  analogy  between  the  influence  of  a 
demagogue  and  the  power  of  a  despot  is 
forcibly  emphasized  by  Aristotle.  Distin- 
guishing between  the  type  of  democracy  in 
which  the  law  is  supreme  and  that  in  which 
the  temporary  popular  will  shows  no  regard 
for  established  law,  he  says:  "The  latter 
state  of  things  occurs  when  the  government 
is  administered  by  plebiscite,  or  popular 
vote,  and  not  according  to  laws,  and  it  is 
57 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

produced  by  the  influence  of  the  dema- 
gogues. In  democracies  administered  ac- 
cording to  law  there  are  no  demagogues; 
but  where  the  laws  are  not  supreme,  dema- 
gogues arise.  For  the  people  become,  as  it 
were,  a  compound  monarch,  each  individual 
being  only  invested  with  power  as  a  mem- 
ber of  the  sovereign  body;  and  a  people  of 
this  sort,  as  if  they  were  a  monarch,  seek 
to  exercise  a  monarchical  power,  in  order 
that  they  may  not  be  governed  by  the  law, 
and  they  assume  thi  character  of  a  despot; 
wherefore  flatterers  are  in  honor  with  them. 
A  democracy  of  this  sort  is  analogous  to  a 
tyranny  or  despotism  among  monarchies." 
Pointing  out  that  the  power  of  dema- 
gogues increases  as  the  people  can  be  dis- 
posed to  disregard  the  established  law  and 
the  magistrates  who  enforce  it,  he  concludes : 
"Accordingly,  it  seems  to  have  been  justly 
said,  that  a  democracy  of  this  sort  is  not 
58 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

entitled  to  the  name  of  a  constitution;  for 
where  the  laws  are  not  supreme,  there  is 
no  constitution.  In  order  that  there  should 
be  a  constitution,  it  is  necessary  that  the 
government  should  be  administered  accord- 
ing to  the  laws,  and  that  the  magistrates  and 
constituted  authorities  should  decide  in  the 
individual  cases  respecting  the  application 
of  them." 

CONSTITUTIONAL  CHANGES 

Undoubtedly,  any  inflexible  obstacle  to 
a  transitory  popular  impulse  can  at  times 
be  made  to  appear  too  rigid;  but  it  is  pre- 
cisely this  clear  and  definite  obstruction  to 
impulsive  and  ill-considered  action  which 
constitutional  guarantees  are  intended  to 
impose.  It  is  always  a  dangerous  moment 
for  the  liberties  of  a  people  when  it  is  pro- 
posed to  substitute  for  the  deliberately  es- 
tablished reasonableness  of  a  constitutional 
59 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

provision  the  impromptu  and  uncontrolled 
impulses  of  the  moment,  or  to  open  the  way, 
without  serious  reflection  and  debate,  for 
mere  political  experiments. 

It  may  be  necessary  with  the  emergence 
of  new  conditions  to  change  in  certain  par- 
ticulars constitutional  provisions  which  fail 
to  serve  the  purpose  for  which  they  were 
intended;  but  no  real  friend  of  constitu- 
tional government  can  wish  to  facilitate  or 
multiply  amendments  without  a  deliberate 
and  cautious  consideration  of  all  their  pos- 
sible effects. 

Two  recent  constitutional  changes  have 
been  urged  and  passively  accepted  by  the 
people  of  the  United  States.  The  election 
of  the  United  States  senators  by  legisla- 
tive bodies  had  sometimes  been  attended 
with  corruption,  and  this  led  to  a  demand 
for  popular  nominations  and  elections.  In 
order  to  lower  import  duties,  an  income 
60 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

tax — hitherto  left  to  the  several  States, 
which  can  levy  no  import  taxes — had  been 
urged  as  a  means  of  meeting  the  expenses 
of  the  Federal  Government.  To  accom- 
plish this  a  constitutional  change  was  neces- 
sary, since  the  Constitution  as  adopted  re- 
quired the  ■  apportionment  of  direct  taxes 
among  the  States,  and  this  method  was  not 
deemed  practicable.  It  is,  perhaps,  too  early 
to  demonstrate  the  full  results  of  these 
changes;  and  it  remains  to  be  seen  how  the 
people,  if  they  could  not  succeed  in  choos- 
ing trustworthy  legislators  from  among 
their  own  immediate  neighbors,  will  be  able 
to  select  worthier  senators  from  among  per- 
sons whom  they  know  chiefly  through  news- 
paper representations,  many  of  which  are 
paid  advertisements;  nor  is  it  certain  that 
the  power  to  impose  a  graduated  income 
tax,  without  any  kind  of  restriction,  may 
not  eventually  become  the  instrument  of 
61 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

mere  class  and  sectional  legislation.  It  will, 
of  course,  be  gratifying  if  these  two  ex- 
periments result  in  an  elevation  of  political 
morals  or  in  greater  social  equity,  but  it  is 
not  yet  certain  that  these  results  will  be 
attained. 

UNCONSTITUTIONAL  ENCROACHMENTS 

A  second  method  of  attack  upon  the  Fed- 
eral Constitution  is  through  the  encroach- 
ment of  one  or  more  of  the  three  divisions 
of  public  power  upon  the  legitimate  do- 
main of  the  others.  The  American  con- 
ception of  government  has  always  laid  stress 
upon  the  balance  of  the  public  powers, 
which  is  intended  to  limit  the  excesses  of 
all.  When,  however,  we  consider  the  pos- 
sible effect  of  concentrating  power  in  one 
man  personally  both  to  urge  and  to  veto 
new  legislation,  backed  with  the  enormous 
influence  of  Federal  patronage,  the  employ- 
62 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

ment  of  which  may  be  easily  concealed  be- 
hind a  mask  of  apparently  beneficent  legis- 
lation, we  are  confronted  with  the  nearest 
approach  to  absolute  power  now  to  be  found 
in  any  constitutional  government  in  the 
world.  In  defense  of  this  centralization  of 
authority  it  may  be  said  that  a  President 
of  the  United  States  is  responsible  to  the 
country,  and  particularly  to  his  party,  for 
the  fulfillment  of  promises  made  in  the  plat- 
form of  the  party  that  elected  him,  and  this  is 
true ;  but  executive  urgency  and  executive 
prohibition  have  not  always  been  exercised 
exclusively  with  the  purpose  of  fulfilling 
party  promises,  but  sometimes  merely  upon 
the  personal  initiative  of  the  executive  him- 
self, who  has  thereby  assumed  the  exercise 
of  a  prerogative  which,  however  pleasing  it 
may  be  to  those  who  profit  by  its  results, 
when  considered  from  a  constitutional  point 
of  viewy  is  certainly  of  questionable  pro- 
63 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

priety  if  not  of  doubtful  legality.  Fidelity 
in  urging  the  fulfillment  of  previously  made 
party  promises  and  personal  ballons  d'essai, 
sent  up  for  electoral  purposes  without  re- 
gard to  the  previously  determined  policies 
of  the  party  or  even  in  contradiction  to 
them,  are  two  entirely  different  methods  of 
official  procedure.  The  business  of  a  Presi- 
dent is  to  execute  the  laws  and  urge  the  ful- 
fillment of  party  pledges,  but  it  is  not  his 
prerogative  to  revolutionize  the  govern- 
ment. 

UNCONSTITUTIONAL  LEGISLATION 

But  encroachments  upon  constitutional 
limitations  by  the  executive  are  not  more 
dangerous  than  those  of  a  legislative  origin. 
For  these  latter  there  is,  it  is  true,  always 
the  plausible  excuse  that  they  spring  more 
directly  from  the  expressed  will  of  the  peo- 
ple, especially  when  the  legislators  have 
64 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

received  a  general  mandate  from  this  source. 
It  is,  however,  a  perversion  of  reasoning  to 
maintain  that  their  mandate  ever  includes 
an  instruction  to  disregard  the  spirit  of  the 
Constitution,  or  to  strain  it  to  the  breaking 
point.  It  is  therefore  essential  that  the  ju- 
diciary, whose  function  it  is  to  apply  the 
fundamental  law,  be  free,  pure,  and  faithful 
in  its  interpretation  of  it.  It  is  equally  im- 
portant that  it  should  have  the  confidence 
and  support  of  the  people.  Nothing  could 
so  fatally  affect  the  foundations  of  consti- 
tutional government  as  a  loss  of  confidence 
on  the  part  of  the  people  in  the  purity,  fidel- 
ity, and  intelligence  of  the  judiciary.  By 
every  means  that  will  leave  it  free  and  re- 
sponsible it  should  be  placed  and  kept  upon 
the  highest  plane  of  honor  and  authority, 
for  it  is  by  its  essential  nature  the  guardian 
of  our  guarantees  of  liberty. 


65 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE  RENUNCIATION  OF  ARBITRARY  POWER 

There  is  a  third  and  far  more  insidious 
form  of  attack  upon  constitutional  govern- 
ment which  should  not  escape  observation. 
It  is  the  disposition  to  withdraw  and  annul 
that  act  of  popular  renunciation  of  each  in 
the  interest  of  all  upon  which  the  success 
of  the  American  system  of  constitutional 
government  is  based.  It  is  important  that 
this  point  should  be  made  clear,  for  it  con- 
tains the  chief  justification  for  speaking  of 
a  "crisis"  in  American  constitutionalism. 

Attention  has  been  called  to  the  fact  that 
the  third  step  in  the  development  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  the 
voluntary  surrender  of  arbitrary  power  by 
the  sovereign  people.  This  was  not  an  abdi- 
cation of  power  by  the  people  as  a  whole 
in  the  interest  of  a  majority,  but  a  deter- 
mination that  absolutism  in  every  form 
66 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

should  be  abolished  altogether ;  and  that  even 
the  majority  should  be  denied  the  exercise 
of  arbitrary  power.  It  was  the  complete 
surrender  of  will  to  reason,  of  private  inter- 
est to  public  good,  of  the  individual  to  the 
State  as  the  institution  of  organized  justice. 
The  greatest  present  danger  to  constitu- 
tional government  in  the  United  States  is 
the  possible  revocation  of  this  splendid  sac- 
rifice of  personal  advantage  to  the  common 
well-being;  for  there  are  indications  that  the 
agreement  of  the  people  not  to  attempt  an 
act  of  conquest  upon  one  another,  but  to  live 
on  terms  of  equality  under  just  laws,  may 
be  revoked. 

RESULTS  OF  THE  SPIRIT  OF  DOMINATION 

It  is  worthy  of  observation  that  wherever 
the  renunciation  of  arbitrary  power  has  not 
been  made,  constitutional  government  has 
67 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

proved  an  abject  failure.  If  we  consider  the 
revolutions  that  have  stained  with  blood  and 
ruined  the  economic  life  of  several  of  our 
sister  republics  on  this  continent,  we  shall 
find  ample  and  striking  illustrations  of  this 
assertion.  They,  like  ourselves,  have  had  a 
fundamental  law,  often  expressed  in  most 
irreproachable  language,  and  a  frame  of 
government  in  which  the  division  of  powers 
is  theoretically  accepted.  In  fact,  however, 
these  elements  of  constitutional  organization 
have  not  been  treated  as  realities.  Personal 
ambition,  conspiracy,  and  revolution  have 
defied  the  system,  and  frequently  destroyed 
it.  Instead  of  devoting  themselves  to  the 
State  and  making  a  religion  of  vital  patriot- 
ism— that  is,  of  consecration  to  the  State  as 
the  institution  of  order  and  justice — these 
unfortunate  republicans  have  attached  them- 
selves to  factions,  each  seeking  to  dominate 
by  force  the  others,  and  thus  creating  a  scene 
68 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

of  constant  incertitude,  turmoil,  lawlessness, 
and  rapine. 

We  have  at  the  present  moment  a  start- 
ling example  of  this  assertion  of  arbitrary 
will  and  repudiation  of  public  authority  in 
our  nearest  neighbor  to  the  south.  Every- 
one who  personally  knows  the  Mexican 
statesmen  of  the  highest  type  appreciates 
their  learning,  their  culture,  and  their  some- 
times great  executive  ability.  What  is  lack- 
ing to  that  country?  It  is  the  spirit  of  per- 
sonal renunciation  of  arbitrary  power  in  the 
interest  of  the  public  well-being.  Rich  in 
natural  resources,  situated  in  a  most  favor- 
able geographical  environment,  and  not 
wanting  in  capable  men,  Mexico  is  doomed 
to  stagnation,  poverty,  and  discredit  because 
it  is  the  prey  of  rival  forces  within  the  State, 
each  claiming  the  right  to  rule,  each  deter- 
mined to  destroy  the  others. 


69 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE  FRUITS  OF  GOVERNMENT   BY  LAW 

Let  US  not  lose  the  lesson  of  this  impres- 
sive illustration  of  the  unwillingness  of  men 
to  accept  the  authority  of  principles  because 
we  ourselves  are  not  at  present  harassed  by 
banditti  and  visibly  divided  by  opposing 
powers  within  the  State.  It  is  opportune 
for  us  to  ask  ourselves  why  we  are  not  sub- 
jected to  this  anarchy,  and  why  we  enjoy 
a  high  degree  of  peace,  order,  and  justice  in 
our  own  republic,  which  is  based  on  the 
same  fundamental  ideas  as  that  of  our  un- 
fortunate neighbors? 

The  answer  to  this  question  is  evident  to 
every  thoughtful  observer.  We  have  thus 
far  been  able  to  maintain  respect  for  our 
Constitution  and  our  judiciary.  We  have, 
in  the  interest  of  the  public  peace,  renounced 
the  primitive  right  of  personal  self-defense. 
We  have  differences,  but  we  endeavor,  for 
70 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

the  most  part,  to  settle  them  by  an  appeal 
to  the  law  and  to  the  courts.  We  have  thus 
far  maintained  the  renunciation  of  arbitrary- 
power  which  has  made  our  government  a 
success  where  others  have  failed,  and  we 
have  had,  and  are  having,  our  reward. 

THE   DANGER   OF   CLASS   CONTROL 

Will  this  condition  always  continue? 
There  is  more  than  one  sign  that,  unless  we 
are  on  our  guard,  it  will  not.  The  dangers 
arising  from  the  first  and  second  forms  of 
attack  on  constitutional  government  are  not 
unworthy  of  attention,  but  they  are  insig- 
nificant in  comparison  with  the  third;  for 
further  alterations  cannot  be  made  in  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  without 
fresh  consideration  by  the  people,  and  a  mis- 
use of  power  by  the  legislative  and  execu- 
tive, or  even  by  the  judicial  authorities  is 
71 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

at  least  subject  to  correction.  But  the  third 
form  of  attack  is  of  a  different  nature.  It 
results  from  a  scheme  of  social  transforma- 
tion that  may  affect  constitutionalism  at  its 
source  through  a  perversion  of  the  minds  of 
the  people. 

For  a  long  time  the  chief  danger  to  con- 
stitutionalism in  our  country  was  the  men- 
ace of  conflict  between  the  States.  That 
peril  seems  now  to  have  passed,  for  the 
interests  of  the  States  in  the  Union  are 
so  nearly  identical  and  their  populations 
are  so  nearly  homogeneous  that  a  di- 
vergence of  purposes  sufficiently  wide  to 
lead  to  armed  conflict  is  altogether  im- 
probable. 

But  there  is  another  source  of  antagonism 
which  would  have  an  equally  disastrous  ef- 
fect upon  constitutional  government,  the 
possibility  of  which  is  not  entirely  excluded 
from  consideration. 

72 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

We  have  in  recent  years  developed  in  the 
United  States  a  spirit  of  class  antagonism 
which  is  peculiarly  disquieting.  In  stating 
this  point  it  is  not  at  all  necessary  to  cast 
the  blame  on  any  particular  stratum  of  so- 
ciety, and  a  careful  analysis  might  distribute 
responsibility  in  a  manner  that  would  not  be 
welcome  in  quite  opposite  quarters.  The 
one  undeniable  fact  is  that  this  antagonism 
exists  and  has  been  stimulated  by  political 
ambitions  that  have  found  their  advantage 
in  creating  unrest  and  in  deepening  the  hos- 
tility of  certain  conditions  of  life  toward 
others. 

The  peril  of  the  situation  is  that  it  does 
not  consist  merely  in  opposing  personal  sen- 
timents entertained  by  isolated  individuals, 
but  it  aims  to  control  the  State  by  massing 
its  forces  in  powerful  organizations  with 
the  purpose  of  changing  the  laws,  and  even 
the  Constitution,  in  the  interest  of  special 
73 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

classes.    This  is  the  open  repudiation  of  all 
that  is  understood  by  "Americanism." 


THE   ATTACKS   UPON   THE   CONSTITUTION 

Books  have  recently  been  written  with  the 
endeavor  to  make  it  appear  that  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States  is  an  antiquat- 
ed eighteenth-century  construction,  devised 
solely  in  the  interest  of  a  property-possess- 
ing class,  and  is  at  present  an  anachronism. 
For  the  first  time  since  it  was  adopted  the 
Constitution  has  within  very  recent  years 
been  treated  with  open  disrespect.  What  is 
the  reason  for  this  opposition?  It  is  that 
the  Constitution  presents  an  obvious  bar- 
rier to  the  designs  of  those  who  oppose  it. 
If  we  seek  the  actuating  principle  of  this 
opposition,  we  find  it  in  the  doctrine  that  the 
unregulated  and  changeable  will  of  the  ma- 
jority is  a  more  desirable  form  of  authority 
74 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

than  deliberately  accepted  principles  of  gov- 
ernment sanctioned  by  general  assent  and 
tried  and  tested  by  experience. 

Should  this  tendency  become  further  ac- 
centuated by  combinations  of  power  able 
eventually  to  control  the  State  in  their  own 
interest,  we  should  find  ourselves  in  a  posi- 
tion not  dissimilar  to  that  in  which  Mexico 
is  placed  today — divided  into  hostile  fac- 
tions, one  class  plundered  by  another,  and 
the  country  utterly  powerless  to  defend  its 
interests  or  maintain  its  dignity  in  the  field 
of  international  relations. 

THE   DRIFT  OF  SOCIAL  FORCES 

In  considering  the  drift  of  the  social  forces 
now  in  operation,  one  is  struck  by  the  di- 
minished respect  for  law.  This  is,  no  doubt, 
in  part  owing  to  the  changed  conception  of 
the  source  of  legal  authority.  When  men 
75 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

sincerely  believed  in  "inalienable  rights"  and 
conceived  of  law  as  the  guardian  of  those 
rights,  it  was  esteemed  worthy  of  a  senti- 
ment of  reverence.  At  present  the  impor- 
tation of  a  conception  of  law  as  the  decree 
of  a  dominating  will,  without  relation  to  fun- 
damental rights — ^which  are  alleged  to  have 
no  demonstrable  existence — has  made  it  dif- 
ficult to  respect  law  in  and  for  itself.  If, 
after  all,  it  is  merely  arbitrary;  if  it  pro- 
ceeds from  no  moral  principle;  if,  in  short, 
it  is  the  expression  of  mere  will  and  not  of 
reason ;  it  is  difficult,  it  is  even  unreasonable, 
to  demand  that  it  be  respected. 

It  is  necessary  in  the  life  of  every  nation 
that  from  time  to  time  it  be  called  upon  to 
reflect  upon  the  principles  that  underlie  its 
existence.  The  present  generation  until  now 
has  been  confronted  with  no  great  national 
crisis  that  has  called  for  such  reflection.  The 
shock  that  has  been  given  to  the  party  sys- 
76 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

tern  of  government  in  the  United  States 
may  prove  to  be  such  a  crisis.  We  have 
suddenly  been  brought  face  to  face  with  the 
question:  What  is  our  political  future  to  be? 
It  is  for  the  reason  and  the  conscience  of 
the  people  to  answer,  but  it  remains  to  be 
determined  on  what  lines  the  answer  is  to 
be  given. 

THE   NEEDED   REVIVAL  OF  AMERICANISM 

The  only  means  of  preventing  the  ulti- 
mate collapse  of  constitutionalism  as  con- 
ceived by  the  founders  of  this  republic,  and 
the  only  remedy  if  this  calamity  is  in  some 
degree  already  upon  us,  is  a  firm  determina- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  people  that  arbitrary 
power  in  every  form  must  be  renounced; 
that  life,  liberty,  and  property  shall  still 
enjoy  protection  against  any  form  of  abso- 
lutism that  may  be  asserted  witljin  the  State. 
77 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

To  apply  this  remedy  the  country  needs 
two  things:  first,  to  consider  seriously  the 
drift  of  the  social  forces  now  operating 
among  us,  with  a  view  to  forming  a  clear 
conception  of  the  degree  in  which  we  are 
adhering  to  or  departing  from  the  spirit 
of  conformity  to  just  and  equal  laws;  and, 
second,  an  active  movement  on  the  part  of 
thoughtful  citizens  to  oppose  anti-constitu- 
tional tendencies. 


PRINCIPLES  VERSUS  PERSONALITIES 

Naturally,  in  moments  of  indecision  men 
look  for  leaders,  but  unless  they  look  also 
for  principles  they  look  in  vain.  The  choice 
must  be  made  between  experiment  and  ex- 
perience, between  arbitrary  decisions  and 
fundamental  principles;  in  a  word,  between 
political  anarchy  and  constitutional  govern- 
ment. 

78 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 

The  one  thing  most  certain  is  that  if  we 
are  to  preserve  and  justify  constitutional 
government,  we  must  be  ever  ready  to  de- 
fend it.  If  we  are  to  defend  it,  all  who  be- 
Heve  in  it  must  act  together.  To  many 
minds  it  seems  at  this  moment  the  one  over- 
mastering issue.  When  principles  have  been 
settled  men  have  always  been  found  to  ren- 
der them  effective.  What  we  need  at  pres- 
ent is  not  so  much  leaders  as  a  determi- 
nation to  follow  no  one  not  guided  by 
the  principles  by  which  we  should  be  led, 
and  which  we  should  then  insist  upon  hav- 
ing applied  in  practice.  In  seeking  for 
these  we  cannot  do  better  than  to  revert  to 
the  great  doctrines  of  our  fathers,  which,  in 
the  midst  of  revolutions  on  every  side,  have 
brought  us  to  great  power  as  a  nation, 
and  which,  if  faithfully  applied,  will  con- 
tinue to  give  us  great  prosperity  as  a 
people. 

79 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE  ONLY  ROCK  OF  SALVATION 

If,  amidst  the  dissolution  of  party  ties, 
which  has  brought  home  to  us  the  problem 
of  our  political  future,  we  are  able  to  rally 
about  the  one  rock  of  salvation,  the  rights 
of  the  individual  citizen  as  guaranteed  by 
the  Constitution,  the  atmosphere  will  clear. 
We  shall  see  that  a  State  cannot  be  built 
upon  private  interests  of  any  kind,  and  that 
our  prosperity  as  a  republic  consists  in  the 
readiness  to  renounce  the  control  of  the 
State  for  our  own  advantage,  by  giving  to 
each  individual  not  only  full  liberty  to  ex- 
ercise and  develop  all  his  powers  in  his  own 
way,  but  protection  in  preserving  that  lib- 
erty by  preventing  the  public  powers  from 
falling  under  the  domination  of  any  class 
or  combination  of  men  having  for  its  ob- 
ject the  subjection  of  others  to  their  private 
wiU. 

80 


CRISIS  IN  CONSTITUTIONALISM 
THE  NEED  OF  ORGANIZATION 

Considered  individually,  the  vast  majority 
of  the  citizens  of  the  United  States  are 
firmly  convinced  of  the  excellence  of  their 
system  of  government.  Collectively,  they 
act  almost  exclusively  through  political  or- 
ganizations. If,  however,  these  seek  success 
in  a  race  for  radicalism,  each  trying  to  outdo 
the  other  in  promoting  private  interests  for 
the  purpose  of  carrying  elections,  who  can 
be  depended  upon  to  look  after  the  con- 
servation of  the  constitutional  guarantees? 

In  the  days  of  our  Civil  War  much  aid 
was  afforded  to  the  cause  of  preserving  the 
Union  by  the  formation  of  clubs  composed 
of  citizens  who  perceived  in  that  movement 
the  great  issue  of  the  hour.  Is  it  not  possible 
that  the  time  has  come  when  a  similar  inter- 
est in  the  preservation  of  constitutional  gov- 
ernment, through  the  cultivation  of  respect 
7  81 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

for  the  spirit  of  the  Constitution,  may  be 
desirable  and  even  necessary?  ^ 

There  are  overwhehning  proofs  that  we 
are  at  present  passing  through  a  crisis  in 
which  the  great  structure  of  liberty  and  jus- 
tice erected  by  our  fathers  is  being  insidi- 
ously undermined;  not  in  the  interest  of 
the  people,  of  whose  rights  it  is  the  only 
guarantee,  but  in  the  interest  of  private  pow- 
ers within  the  State,  which,  for  purposes  of 
their  own,  wish  to  dominate  it  and  employ 
it  as  the  instrument  of  their  designs. 

*  Since  these  words  were  written,  and  partly  in 
consequence  of  them,  a  society  has  been  formed  call- 
ing itself  "The  National  Association  for  Constitu- 
tional Government,"  having  its  headquarters  at 
Washington,  D.  C,  Colorado  Building.  This  and 
the  following  chapter  were  first  published  in  the 
North  American  Review,  and  are  reprinted  here  by 
the  permission  of  the  editor. 


Ill 

TAKING  SOUNDINGS 


Ill 

TAKING   SOUNDINGS 

No  one  familiar  with  political  develop- 
ments in  the  United  States  in  the  last  ten 
years  can  doubt  that  radical  changes  have 
occurred  in  the  ideas  and  sentiments  of  a 
considerable  portion  of  the  American  peo- 
ple. It  has  been  felt  in  many  quarters  that 
something  is  wrong  in  the  adjustment  of 
our  system  of  government  to  our  social 
needs.  It  was,  perhaps,  natural,  and  even 
inevitable,  that  the  weight  of  criticism 
should  fall  upon  the  American  system  rather 
than  upon  the  abuses  of  it;  leading  to  the 
hasty  conclusion  that  the  form  of  govern- 
ment had  been  outgrown,  and  that  radical 
revision  had  become  necessary. 

The  passion  for  speed,  which  is  charac- 
85 


-  AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

teristic  of  our  people,  did  not  fail  to  exer- 
cise its  influence  upon  the  process  of  popu- 
lar thinking;  with  the  result  that  spontane- 
ous impulses  and  imperfect  analyses  have 
in  a  great  degree  been  substituted  for  de- 
fensible fundamental  principles. 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  FIXED  PRINCIPLES 

In  the  period  when  our  government  was 
established  it  was  the  common  conviction 
that  there  are  some  individual  and  personal 
rights  so  clear,  so  undeniable,  and  so  worthy 
of  protection  that  they  should  receive  the 
most  trustworthy  guarantees  that  could  pos- 
sibly be  accorded  to  them.  In  this  spirit 
the  early  State  Constitutions  were  con- 
ceived, and  later  the  Federal  Constitution, 
as  finally  agreed  upon,  the  people  insisting 
upon  the  explicit  recognition  of  these  rights 
in  their  fundamental  law.  By  this  they 
86 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

meant  to  set  limits  to  every  form  of  govern- 
mental power  which  might  ever  tend  to  in- 
vade these  rights.  Thus,  for  the  first  time 
in  the  history  of  the  world,  life,  liberty,  and 
property  were  intended  to  be  placed  under 
the  protection  of  a  law  so  inclusive  that  it 
would  in  the  future  bind  all  executives,  all 
legislatures,  and  all  courts. 

A  singular  example  of  hasty  and  super- 
ficial thinking  is  to  be  found  in  the  disposi- 
tion to  belittle  the  importance  of  the  great 
principles  of  "Law,"  as  compared  with  the 
alleged  exigencies  of  "Life";  as  if  there  were 
some  kind  of  contradiction  or  incompatibil- 
ity between  them.  Thus,  a  writer  who  has 
been  esteemed  as  a  high  authority  in  the 
science  of  government,  has  suggested,  for 
the  purposes  of  an  electoral  campaign,  and 
with  an  evident  intention  of  disparagement, 
that  "the  Constitution  of  the  United  States 
has  been  made  under  the  dominion  of  the 
87 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Newtonian  theory";  and  adds  that  the  men 
of  that  period  "represent  Congress,  the  Ju- 
diciary, and  the  President  as  a  sort  of  imi- 
tation of  the  solar  system."  "The  Consti- 
tution," he  concludes,  "was  founded  on  the 
law  of  gravitation,"  which  he  considers 
purely  mechanical,  and  proceeds  to  assure 
us  that,  under  the  regime  of  "New  Free- 
dom" which  he  promised  to  establish,  gov- 
ernment, which  is  "a  living  thing,"  and  not  a 
mere  machine  such  as  the  Constitution  con- 
structed, "is  accountable  to  Darwin,  not  to 
Newton."  In  other  words,  such  antiquated 
principles  as  the  "law  of  gravitation,"  which 
were  deemed  of  importance  by  the  founders 
of  the  American  government,  are  now  to  be 
superseded  by  doctrines  analogous  to  the 
less  exact  processes  of  biological  speculation, 
on  the  ground  that  "government  is  a  living 
thing." 


88 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 
THE   ESSENTIAL  PERMANENCE   OF   LAW 

There  is  aptness  in  this  simile;  but  it 
hardly  justifies  the  inference  that,  since 
"government  is  a  living  thing,"  "it  is  ac- 
countable to  Darwin,  not  to  Newton." 
Whatever  the  biologic  laws  may  be — if  in- 
deed it  is  even  possible  to  state  them  clearly 
— they  have  not  superseded  or  rendered 
superfluous  the  law  of  gravitation.  All 
living  organisms  that  ever  were,  are,  or  are 
to  be,  have  been  and  will  be  subject  to  it; 
and,  however  varied,  fecund,  and  marvelous 
the  process  of  natural  evolution  may  prove 
to  be,  we  shall  forever  be  obliged  to  go  back 
to  Newton  and  his  "Principia"  for  an  intelli- 
gible theory  of  the  universe.  In  like  man- 
ner, we  shall  be  compelled  to  return  to  the 
great  principles  of  human  justice  underly- 
ing the  Constitution  for  a  defensible  theory 
of  the  State.  We  may  have  changed,  but 
89 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

the  law  of  gravitation  still  controls  our  foot- 
steps; society  may  have  changed,  but  the 
great  principles  of  ethics  are  its  only  sure 
foundation;  our  ideas  may  have  changed, 
but  the  laws  of  logic,  by  which  alone  they 
may  be  consistently  coordinated,  still  re- 
main unaltered. 

THE   SUBSTITUTION   OF   EXPERIMENT   FOR 
EXPERIENCE 

Nevertheless,  the  suggestion  that  the 
present  is  a  Darwinian  rather  than  a  New- 
tonian age  is  one  full  of  illumination;  but 
this  notion  does  not  warrant  us  in  believing 
that  Nature  has  changed  her  laws,  or  that 
these  laws  are  changeable.  It  means  simply 
that  in  our  minds  the  process  of  change  is 
receiving  a  degree  of  attention  greater  than 
in  the  past,  and  that  by  centering  our 
thought  upon  the  idea  of  transformation  it- 
self we  may  be  losing  sight  both  of  the  con- 
90 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

ditions  upon  which  beneficial  changes  may 
depend  and  the  results  that  may  follow  from 
our  insistence  upon  radical  action.  Al- 
though it  is  true  that  we  live  in  an  age 
when  the  evolutionary  process  has  taken  the 
foremost  place  in  our  thoughts,  it  is  im- 
portant to  remember  that,  so  far  as  we  know 
anything  about  it,  it  has  never  been  a  rapid 
process,  and,  in  the  Darwinian  sense  at 
least,  has  been  an  unconscious  adjustment 
to  natural  conditions  rather  than  a  swift 
and  purposeful  transformation. 

It  is  precisely  here  that  the  substitution 
of  experiment  for  experience  presents  grave 
dangers.  If  we  truly  wish  to  be  wise,  or — 
should  that  be  more  agreeable — if  we  wish 
to  be  rigorously  scientific,  what  we  should 
be  most  concerned  about  is  to  know  pre- 
cisely why  and  how  our  existing  political  in- 
stitutions came  into  being,  rather  than  to 
engage  in  the  exploitation  of  extemporized 
91 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

schemes  for  destroying  them.  In  our  coun- 
try the  danger  of  erring  in  this  matter  is 
greater  than  in  almost  any  other,  for  the 
reason  that  we  have  less  of  the  historic  sense 
and  more  of  the  spirit  of  initiative  than  any 
other  people.  In  private  matters,  and  even 
in  private  associative  action,  this  may  be  of 
little  consequence;  for  failure  to  justify  our 
theories  by  achievements  involves  nothing 
more  serious  than  private  loss  or  disappoint- 
ment. In  public  matters,  however,  the  sub- 
stitution of  impulses  for  deliberate  reflec- 
tion, of  unrestrained  action  for  measured 
powers,  and  of  improvised  schemes  for  set- 
tled principles  becomes  a  danger  of  incal- 
culable magnitude. 

REASON  VERSUS  EMOTION 

Those  of  us  who  distinguish  between  rea- 
son and  emotion,  between  reflection  and  im- 
92 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

pulse,  between  world  experience  and  spas- 
modic action,  believe  that  a  fundamental  law 
forbidding  class,  sectional,  and  inspirational 
legislation  is  the  indispensable  guarantee  of 
personal  liberty  and  the  necessary  basis  of 
true  social  justice.  We  are  opposed,  openly 
and  fearlessly,  to  those  who,  for  private  or 
alleged  public  motives,  would  ruthlessly 
sweep  it  away.  We  are  of  the  opinion  that 
a  non-Newtonian  and  otherwise  undisci- 
plined state  of  mind  is  a  dangerous  one  for 
the  well-being  of  the  republic.  We  freely 
admit  that  there  are  fewer  purely  personal 
motives  for  defending  the  work  of  the  past 
than  there  are  for  initiating  new  and  ill- 
considered  schemes  of  public  action.  We  do 
not  forget  that  novelty  pleases,  and  that  con- 
ditions imposed  by  the  past  are  often  felt 
to  be  at  fault  when  our  misfortunes  are  in 
reality  to  be  attributed  to  other  causes.  We 
are  aware  that  those  who  seek  the  support 
93 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

and  admiration  of  their  fellow-citizens  find 
it  to  their  advantage  to  offer  to  them  a 
Promised  Land  flowing  with  milk  and 
honey.  We  realize  also  that  the  smug  con- 
tentment of  those  who  feel  themselves  be- 
yond the  reach  of  personal  harm,  and  who 
say  in  their  souls,  "After  us  the  deluge," 
constitutes  an  absolutely  negligible  quan- 
tity either  for  promoting  needed  reforms  or 
resisting  public  evils.  It  is  from  the  ethi- 
cally minded  and  public-spirited  men  and 
women  of  the  country,  alone,  that  any  inter- 
est in  such  questions  is  to  be  expected,  or 
upon  whom  any  dependence  for  unselfish 
action  can  be  placed.  And  yet  it  is  worth 
while  to  take  soundings,  and  to  point  out 
to  those  who  have  an  open  mind  the  perils 
by  which  we  are  confronted,  and  especially 
to  leave  on  record  for  the  future  the  fact  that 
blindness  and  inertness  were  not  universal 
in  the  period  of  demolition,  if  such  a  period 
94 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

shall  follow,  when  the  ^reat  work  of  our 
fathers  is  to  be  undone.  It  may  be,  after 
all,  when  public  attention  is  turned  to  the 
facts,  that  the  efforts  of  our  time  to  wipe 
out  and  utterly  efface  the  distinction  be- 
tween a  fundamental  law  and  ordinary  leg- 
islation, and  to  place  absolute  and  unlimited 
power  in  the  hands  of  legislative  majorities 
— or  even,  perchance,  in  the  hands  of  popu- 
lar minorities  afforded  control  by  the  divi- 
sion of  their  fellow-citizens  over  minor  mat- 
ters— may  yet  be  happily  averted.  But  this 
cannot  be,  unless  the  danger  is  realized  and 
united  action  is  substituted  for  indifference. 

NO  DENIAL  OF  OPPOSITION  TO  THE 
CONSTITUTION 

The  first  and  most  important  reflection 

to  occupy  our  attention  here  is  the  fact  that, 

in  the  observations  of  the  press  and  in  the 

private  letters  that  have  come  to  the  writer 

95 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

regarding  an  article  published  by  him  en- 
titled "The  Crisis  in  Constitutionalism," 
no  one  has  denied  that  there  is  a  widespread 
disposition  to  render  easier  the  modification 
of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States; 
yet  no  one  has  cited  a  single  social  reform 
worthy  of  serious  consideration  that  neces- 
sitates a  change  in  our  fundamental  law, 
or  which  cannot  be  carried  into  effect  with- 
out a  change.  In  this  case  the  process  of 
evolution  is  sought  to  be  facilitated  solely 
for  its  own  sake.  In  brief,  it  is  urged  that 
we  should  change  our  fundamental  law,  sim- 
ply because  it  is  a  fundamental  law,  which 
may  some  time  stand  in  the  way  of  what 
a  legislative  majority  may  yet  be  impelled 
to  do. 

VAGUENESS  OF  THE  OPPOSITION 

What  is  the  nature  of  this  contemplated 
legislation  that  finds  itself  obstructed  by 
96 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

the  Constitution?  Strictly  speaking,  it  is 
as  yet  too  much  in  the  state  of  fermentation 
to  declare  itself  distinctly.  If  some  of  the 
purposes  in  view  were  clearly  articulated, 
the  radical  nature  of  this  legislation  would 
be  too  apparent.  The  time  has  not  come 
for  a  frank  disclosure  of  its  terms.  Already 
the  right  of  transmitting  property  by  in- 
heritance has  been  brought  in  question,  and 
the  right  of  the  individual  to  possess  more 
than  a  certain  limited  amount  of  wealth  has 
been  denied  in  high  quarters.  No  one  has 
ventured  to  draw  the  line  at  a  definite  point, 
either  as  respects  possession  or  inheritance; 
or  indicated  any  principle  upon  which  the 
line  could  be  drawn,  where  it  should  begin, 
or  where  it  should  end.  The  one  thing  most 
certain  is  that  it  would  not  end  where  it 
began. 

When  duly  analyzed,  it  becomes  apparent 
that  in  the  process  of  social  evolution  a  new 
8  97 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

conception  of  social  justice  has  been  formed. 
It  has  not  come  into  being  by  any  process 
of  reasoning.  It  is  a  child  of  the  emotions. 
Our  fathers  demanded  just  and  equal  laws. 
The  modern  theorist  replies:  "Equal  laws, 
laws  which  apply  alike  and  equally  to  all 
men,  cannot  be  just."  What  is  demanded 
is  not  "equal  laws"  but  "laws  of  equaliza- 
tion." Equality  of  law  merely  gives  the 
prize  to  industry,  thrift,  enterprise,  and  econ- 
omy. It  creates  differences,  and  bestows  a 
premium  upon  strength,  skill,  and  talent. 
It  is  essentially  aristocratic.  It  recognizes, 
promotes,  and  rewards  superiority.  It  con- 
demns and  indirect^  punishes  incapacity. 
Under  equal  laws  men  cannot  be  equal. 
What  is  demanded  is  equality  of  condition. 
This  can  be  attained  only  by  new  laws,  laws 
which  will  distribute  to  each  from  the  com- 
mon stock  according  to  his  needs. 


98 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 
A  NEW  THEORY  OF  WEALTH 

Two  sophisms  underlie  this  demand.  The 
first  is  a  new  theory  of  the  nature  of  wealth. 
The  idea  that  the  individual  creates  wealth 
and  may  rightfully  possess  it,  it  is  affirmed, 
is  an  erroneous  eighteenth-century  idea  en- 
tertained by  the  founders  of  the  American 
Republic.  Wealth,  on  the  contrary,  is  a 
social  product;  and,  therefore,  rightly  con- 
sidered, a  social  possession.  Value  is  a  rela- 
tion between  supply  and  demand.  It  is  the 
presence  of  others  that  gives  value  to  our 
possessions.  Without  them,  there  would  be 
no  value. 

Plausible  and  seductive  as  this  reasoning 
may  seem,  it  is  plainly  founded  upon  mis- 
conception. Society  as  a  whole  never  yet 
initiated,  conducted,  or  brought  to  success- 
ful achievement  any  industrial  process  or 
any  wealth-producing  activity.  It  is  always 
99 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

an  individual,  or  a  group  of  individuals,  that 
does  these  things.  It  is,  therefore,  a  wholly 
unwarranted  assumption  to  affirm  that  the 
totality  of  wealth  rightfully  belongs  to  so- 
ciety as  a  whole.  It  belongs  to  those  who 
by  their  enterprise,  industry,  and  skill  have 
produced  it,  or  who  by  their  abstinence  from 
consuming  it  have  kept  it  in  existence. 

RIGHTS  AS  THE  GIFTS  OF  SOCIETY 

The  second  sophism  underlying  the  de- 
mand for  unrestrained  legislation  is  the  as- 
sumption that,  since  society  as  a  whole  is 
the  rightful  owner  of  everything,  there  ex- 
ists no  individual  right  that  is  not  based  on 
social  permission. 

The  origin  of  this  conception  of  right,  con- 
sidered historically,  is  evident.  All  rights 
and  all  public  powers  were  formerly  cen- 
tered in  the  ruler,  who  could  grant  them  to 
100 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS,,,  ,^    , 

others  according  to  his  good  pleasure.  When 
the  ruler  was  a  prince,  the  formula  of  govern- 
ment was,  "The  will  of  the  prince  is  law." 
Now  that  the  people  have  become  the  rulers, 
the  formula  has  become,  "The  will  of  the 
people  is  law."  The  people  may  bestow  and 
the  people  may  take  away,  according  to  their 
good  pleasure.  In  the  passage  from  mon- 
archy to  democracy  this  conception  of  sov- 
ereign omnipotence  has  merely  been  trans- 
ferred, but  it  has  not  been  changed.  Popu- 
lar political  thinking  is  still,  in  this  respect, 
as  crude  and  as  fallacious  as  it  was  in  the 
Middle  Ages. 

There  is  not  a  demagogue  in  existence 
who  would  dare  to  say  to  an  American  audi- 
ence that  a  king  or  an  emperor,  because 
he  is  a  sovereign,  has  an  intrinsic  right  to 
take  from  his  people  and  to  distribute  ac- 
cording to  his  will  any  portion  of  their  pri- 
vate property.  On  the  other  hand,  if  there 
101 


AlMERICANiSM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

were  an  instance  of  it  brought  to  public  at- 
tention, he  would  denounce  it  as  flagrant  in- 
justice and  as  a  crime  that  should  bring 
the  offending  monarch  to  the  scaffold.  And 
yet  he  will  tell  the  people  that,  because  tJiey 
are  sovereign,  they  have  a  right,  and  should 
exercise  it  as  a  duty,  to  take  and  distribute 
private  property  to  any  extent  they  please; 
and  that  their  mere  unqualified  will  in  the 
matter  is  the  supreme  source  of  law  on  this 
and  every  other  subject. 

The  fitting  penalty  for  this  sycophancy — 
for  it  is  nothing  else — is  the  prompt  ex- 
posure of  the  flatterer's  selfish  designs.  It 
may  be  easy  to  deceive  the  crowd  into  be- 
lieving that,  being  sovereign,  it  really  pos- 
sesses this  universal  proprietorship;  but  it 
would  take  a  different  view  if  called  upon 
to  endure  this  procedure  by  any  other  sover- 
eign than  itself.  And  the  test  of  sincerity 
is  always  available ;  for  no  man  not  expect- 
102 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

ing  to  profit  by  his  proposal,  either  by  di- 
rectly participating  in  the  proceeds  of  con- 
fiscation or  by  acquiring  public  office  as  a 
confiscatory  agent,  ever  seriously  suggested 
such  procedure. 

THE  TRUE  NATURE  OF  PUBLIC  AUTHORITY 

What  constitutional  government  intended 
to  do  was  to  end  forever  the  idea  that  there 
is  any  rightful  depository  of  unlimited 
power;  in  brief,  to  destroy  the  error  that 
anyone's  will  is  law,  and  to  establish  the 
principle  that  law  is  not  a  product  of  will, 
but  a  system  of  rules  for  the  regulation  of 
will,  derived  from  the  authority  of  reason. 

The  problem  which  the  framers  of  con- 
stitutions encountered  was  not  merely  the 
distribution  of  power,  but  the  nature  of  pub- 
lic authority.  Whence  proceeds  the  right  of 
an  institution  calling  itself  the  State  to  im- 
103 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

pose  its  commands  upon  the  individual  mem- 
bers of  human  society?  The  answer  given 
was:  "There  is  no  rightful  authority,  and 
no  actual  authority  should  be  recognized,  to 
deprive  an  individual  of  his  inherent  rights 
to  life,  liberty,  and  property."  The  State 
itself  is  subject  to  law — to  its  own  funda- 
mental law — by  which  it  and  all  its  organs 
are  bound  to  respect  and  to  safeguard  the 
inherent  rights  of  its  citizens.  If  it  should 
cease  to  do  that,  it  would  cease  to  be  the 
State  in  the  sense  of  the  American  concep- 
tion. 

THE  NATURE  OF  NEW  LEGISLATION  DEMANDED 

It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  there  is  an  in- 
herent and  inevitable  antagonism  between 
the  idea  that  legislative  power  should  be  un- 
restricted and  the  idea  of  a  fundamental 
law  limiting  the  statutory  power. 

Let  us  note,  then,  the  array  of  avowed 
104 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

purposes  actuating  radical  constitutional 
changes  and  pressing  for  an  easier  method 
of  modifying  our  fundamental  law.  I  quote 
a  series  of  public  statements  promulgated 
and  advocated  by  persons  more  or  less  highly 
placed,  and  in  some  instances  representing 
hundreds  of  thousands,  and  even  millions, 
of  supporters: 

The  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  was  framed  by  and  in  the  inter- 
ests of  a  property-possessing  class. 

Property  is  rightfully  the  possession 

.    of  society  as  a  whole;  when  detained 

in  private  hands  it  becomes  a  permanent 

reward  for  a  temporary  service,  or  for 

no  service  at  all. 

The    pretended    right    to    transmit 
property  from  one  generation  to  an- 
other is  not  a  natural  right. 
105 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Corporate  properties  should  be  val- 
ued according  to  their  present  cost  of 
physical  reproduction,  and  may  rightly 
be  taken  over  by  the  people  upon  that 
valuation. 

The  remuneration  of  the  worker  will 
be  determined  either  by  deeds  or  by 
needs,  as  may  hereafter  be  decided ;  but 
most  certainly  not  upon  the  basis  of 
allowing  him  a  reward  according  to  the 
importance  of  his  industrial  product. 

Employers,  as  such,  have  no  right 
to  exist.  The  aim  of  the  employed 
should  be  a  practice  that  will  enable 
workers  to  assume,  as  the  return  for 
their  labor,  the  full  control  of  the  vari- 
ous industries. 

The  idea  of  inalienable  natural  rights 
is  an  erroneous  eighteenth-century  con- 
ception.    Men  have  no  rights,  except 
what  society  concedes  to  them  by  law. 
106 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

No  court  should  be  permitted  to  nul- 
lify any  act  of  a  legislative  body  on  the 
ground  that  it  is  unconstitutional.^ 


THE    PRAGMATIC    CHARACTER    OF    THESE 
DEMANDS 

Let  it  not  be  imagined  that  these  are 
merely  the  sporadic  expressions  of  wholly 
irresponsible  persons,  or  the  incoherent  mut- 
terings  of  discontented  men.  Some  of  these 
doctrines  have  been  heard  in  sermons,  some 
have  been  clipped  from  widely  circulated 
periodicals,  some  have  been  quoted  from 
serious  books,  and  others  are  recorded 
as  the  solemn  resolutions  of  influential 
bodies. 

If  we  were  engaged  in  a  polemic  rather 
than  a  merely  expository  task,  it  would  be 
proper  to  specify  the  sources  of  these  ut- 

^  See  the  author's  "The  People's  Government/'  pp. 
204,  206. 

107 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

terances  and  to  make  an  attempt  to  refute 
them;  but  the  present  purpose  is  merely  to 
indicate  the  elements  of  the  leaven  which  is 
at  present  working  among  the  people  and 
affecting  public  opinion.  If  these  proposi- 
tions were  merely  academic  theses  designed 
to  illustrate  dialetic  skill,  or  innocuous  pri- 
vate judgments  like  opinions  regarding  the 
beauty  or  meaning  of  a  picture,  they  might 
well  be  passed  over  in  silence;  but,  on  the 
contrar}^,  they  are  all  of  a  pragmatic  na- 
ture, involve  the  future  status  and  interests 
of  our  fellow-citizens,  and  contemplate  legal 
changes  through  public  action.  They  sup- 
ply precisely  the  kind  of  materials  sought 
by  those  who,  while  aiming  first  of  all  at 
their  own  self-advancement,  desire  to  ap- 
pear as  the  advocates  of  forms  of  progress 
from  which  their  followers  may  imagine 
themselves  likely  to  receive  a  personal  ben- 
efit. 

108 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 
THE  MASK   OF   PHILANTHROPY 

Unfortunately  some  of  these  proposals  as- 
sume a  close  connection  with  the  aims  of  a 
pure  and  high-minded  philanthropy,  which 
serves  to  conceal  their  sordid  side  and  im- 
parts to  them  a  glamour  of  righteousness 
which  they  do  not  really  possess.  Our  sym- 
pathies with  poverty  and  suffering  and  our 
antipathy  to  cruelty  and  extortion  are  ap- 
pealed to,  and  we  are  led  to  believe  that 
nothing  can  be  wrong  which  brings  to  terms 
those  who  have  revolted  our  consciences  by 
their  avarice  or  inhumanity.  We  are  not, 
in  fact,  called  upon  to  spare  the  feelings  of 
those  who  themselves  spare  neither  manhood 
nor  womanhood  nor  childhood  in  their  ex- 
pedients for  extortion.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  we  should  be  very  untrue  to  the  cause 
of  humanity,  as  well  as  to  the  cause  of  jus- 
tice, if,  in  our  zeal  to  lift  up  the  down- 
109 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

trodden  and  to  support  the  weak,  we  should 
sweep  away  the  basic  guarantees  upon  which 
the  whole  edifice  of  justice  is  erected.  Loy- 
alty to  humanity  lays  upon  us  a  larger  duty 
than  the  iuHnediate  destruction  of  some  sin- 
gle evil,  however  monstrous  it  may  seem  to 
us.  To  cleanse  and  purify  the  temple,  we 
do  not  need  to  create  a  conflagration;  for, 
so  far  as  just  and  needed  social  reforms  are 
concerned,  there  is  probably  not  a  single 
one  that  requires  for  its  accomplishment  any 
radical  change  in  a  system  of  government 
by  which  we  have  progressively  extermi- 
nated so  many  evils. 

THE  CONSTITUTION  NOT  A  CLASS  GUARANTEE 

Nor  can  it  be  fairly  asserted  that  consti- 
tutional government,  as  understood  by  our 
fathers,  is  of  interest  chiefly  to  the  property- 
possessing    class — particularly     the    large 
110 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

property-possessing  portion  of  society.  It 
has  never  been  its  aim  to  protect  any  par- 
ticular class  to  the  disadvantage  of  another ; 
but,  on  the  contrary,  to  see  to  it  that  there 
were  no  insurmountable  barriers  to  block  the 
way  of  human  aspiration,  with  the  result 
that  there  are  few  fortunes  in  our  country 
the  foundations  of  which  were  not  laid  by 
men  who  once  worked  for  wages.  As  for 
the  excessively  great  fortunes,  their  pos- 
sessors are  the  least  likely  to  be  affected  by 
any  radical  legislation,  for  they  will  always 
find  a  safe  asylum  in  which  to  meditate  upon 
their  woes.  It  is  the  wage-earners  and  the 
organizers  and  administrators  of  wealth- 
producing  enterprises  whose  hopes  are 
threatened  by  encroachments  upon  our  con- 
stitutional guarantees ;  for  the  prosperity  of 
the  great  mass  of  our  population  is  depend- 
ent upon  a  mutual  confidence  that  industry 
wiU  be  suitably  rewarded  and  enterprise  en- 
Ill 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

abled  to  prosper.  Nothing  could  so  effec- 
tively check  and  permanently  embarrass  the 
creative  forces  of  the  country  as  the  thought 
that  the  results  of  industry  and  enterprise 
will  be  exposed  to  future  expropriation. 

What  is  to  become  of  superior  skill  or 
of  superior  power  to  organize  and  manage 
great  industries,  if  laws  of  equalization  are 
henceforth  to  be  substituted  for  equal  laws? 
Old  men  may  placidly  fold  their  hands  and 
say  to  themselves,  "Our  work  is  accom- 
plished, and  we  shall  not  be  here  when  the 
coming  cataclysm  arrives" ;  but  how  are  mid- 
dle-aged men,  and  especially  young  men,  to 
regard  with  equanimity  the  prospect  of  un- 
restrained legislation,  based  on  the  assump- 
tion that  "everything  belongs  to  society  as 
a  whole,"  that  "the  worker  is  not  to  be  re- 
warded according  to  the  importance  of  his 
industrial  product,"  that  "employers  as  such 
have  no  right  to  exist,"  and  that  "corporate 
112 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

properties" — built  up  by  years  of  toil  and 
sacrifice — "may  be  taken  over  by  the  people 
at  their  physical  valuation." 

THE  VALUE  OF  CONSTITUTIONAL  GUARANTEES 

And  what  is  to  insure  us  against  this  leg- 
islation if  the  constitutional  guarantees  are 
swept  away?  What  prospect  have  the 
young  men  of  all  classes,  if  some  imperium 
in  imperio,  some  purely  voluntary  and  ir- 
responsible organization  within  the  State, 
is  able  to  fill  public  offices  with  its  candi- 
dates and  through  the  control  of  legislative 
power  impose  its  will  upon  every  form  of 
production,  distribution,  and  consumption? 

Is  there  any  disposition  tending  in  this 
direction?  Is  there  any  power  in  existence, 
or  likely  to  come  into  existence,  that  can 
assume  full  control  of  the  various  indus- 
tries, dictate  the  hours  and  conditions  of 
»  113 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

labor,  the  amount  of  the  product,  the  agen- 
cies through  which  it  shall  be  distributed, 
the  rewards  which  each  participant  shall 
receive?  If  such  a  power  came  into  being, 
what  would  be  left  of  individual  liberty, 
and  what  would  be  the  value  of  each  indi- 
vidual life  ?  Would  there  be  any  open  mar- 
ket in  which  a  man  might  dispose  of  his 
own  wares  at  his  own  price?  Would  there 
be  any  possibility  of  existence  except  upon 
conditions  laid  down  by  the  State,  or  by 
the  imperium  in  imperio  that  controlled  the 
State,  or  by  the  junta  of  persons  permitted 
to  wield  the  power  in  this  machine  within 
a  machine? 

What,  then,  becomes  of  the  conception  of 
society  as  a  "living  thing,"  of  free  citizen- 
ship, of  personal  liberty?  And  where  is  to 
be  found  the  wisdom,  the  integrity,  the  self- 
abnegation  to  give  wholesome  direction  to 
this  mechanism  composed  of  human  beings 
114. 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

fitted  into  wheels  and  pinions,  and  consumed 
to  furnish  its  propelling  power?  Who 
would  be  responsible  for  that  satisfaction  of 
needs,  that  adjustment  of  capacities,  that 
restraint  of  appetites,  that  stimulation  of 
energies  without  which  such  mechanism 
would  be  a  mere  lump  of  death? 

And  what,  finally,  would  be  the  gain  in 
such  a  state  of  human  association,  when 
each  man  proclaimed  that  the  crusts  remain- 
ing were  "common  property,"  withheld  by 
their  transient  possessors  from  those  who 
did  not  possess,  with  the  cry:  "We  are  tak- 
ing that  which  is  ours,  for  all  is  ours  so  long 
as  there  is  a  crumb!" 

THE  SPIRIT  OF  REVOLT  AGAINST   FUNDAMEN- 
TAL LAW 

Only     sporadically      and      occasionally, 
thanks  to  our  traditions  of  respect  for  law 
and  the  constitutional  system  we  have  in- 
115 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

herited,  have  we  been  afflicted  with  scenes 
of  violence  and  open  revolt,  yet  they  have 
not  been  wholly  wanting.  But  the  spirit  of 
revolt  against  the  public  order  secured  by 
our  laws  and  their  constitutional  guarantees 
is  frequently  and  very  boldly  expressed. 

"We  want  to  get  something  for  ourselves, 
now,  not  for  our  grandchildren,"  said  a  paid 
propagandist  of  anti-constitutional  princi- 
ples in  a  public  address  recently  in  a  west- 
ern city. 

"We  can't  accomplish  much  under  our 
government,"  he  continued,  "which  is  clumsy 
and  impossible,  almost  hopeless.  .  .  .  Under 
it  we  can't  pass  any  law  of  consequence  in- 
terfering with  vested  rights.  The  Constitu- 
tion, old,  musty,  and  antiquated,  is  a  barrier, 
with  the  Supreme  Court  all  powerful.  .  .  . 
We  must  get  what  we  want  by  standing  to- 
gether. Do  something  radical." 
116 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

Is  there,  then,  no  "crisis"  in  American 
constitutionahsm  ?  Will  the  foes  of  the  Con- 
stitution ultimately  stand  together?  It  is 
not  unlikely.  Will  its  friends  also  stand 
together?  They  will  continue,  perhaps,  to 
group  themselves  about  opposing  standards 
chiefly  concerned  with  minor  matters,  some- 
times unconsciously  allied  with  elements 
which  they  must  finally  disavow,  until  they 
perceive  that  a  great  menace  to  society  has 
arisen.  Then  they  will  make  haste  to  rally 
about  the  Constitution,  as  their  fathers  ral- 
lied about  the  Union  when  the  gravity  of 
a  situation  too  long  ignored  compelled  their 
attention.    When  will  that  be? 


A   PERILOUS  SITUATION 

In  the  meantime  is  nothing  to  be  done? 
The  opposition  to  the  Constitution  is  by  no 
means  attributable  to  the  importation  of  for- 
117 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

eign  blood  alone.  A  high  school  graduate, 
writing  from  a  western  city,  confides  to  me 
the  change  that  he  has  experienced.  He 
says: 

"My  ancestors  fought  in  1776,  in  1812  and 
in  1860-1865  for  the  establisliment  and  de- 
fense of  constitutional  government.  I  en- 
tered the  workaday  world  with  a  high  re- 
gard for  our  Constitution  and  its  guaran- 
tees and  a  deep  and  glowing  patriotism. 
...  I  agree  with  you,  sir,  that  a  crisis  is 
at  hand  in  constitutionalism,  and  if  those 
who  still  have  faith  in  it  will  make  some 
mighty  concerted  move  to  enforce  its  guar- 
antees and  fulfill  its  mandates  of  abstract 
righteousness,  the  situation  may  yet  be 
saved;  but  for  my  part  I  do  not  think  the 
number  of  those  who  honestly  try  to  en- 
force constitutional  guarantees  is  sufficient 
to  warrant  serious  consideration.  I,  there- 
118 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

fore,  declare  that  I  have  no  faith  in  either 
the  Federal  Constitution  or  its  administra- 
tors, because  neither  it  nor  they  secure  me 
anything.  .  .  .  Could  I  do  so,  I  would  leave 
the  flag  and  these  hypocritical  institutions 
before  another  day.  .  .  .  There  is  naught 
left  for  me  to  do  save  secretly  to  arm,  if  yet 
I  may,  and  await  the  hour  when  a  Francisco 
Villa  shall  arise  on  this  side  of  the  Rio 
Grande  with  the  cry,  *On  to  Washington  1'  '* 
And  what  could  possibly  happen  at  Wash- 
ington that  would  change  this  young  man's 
state  of  mind,  or  the  situation  of  which  his 
frank  expression  is  an  index?  What  is 
needed  is  not  so  much  anything  to  be  done 
at  Washington  as  something  that  might  ad- 
vantageously happen  East,  West,  North 
and  South — a  change  in  the  attitude  of  men 
toward  the  idea  of  law  and  toward  one  an- 
other. It  is  always  the  individual  who  suf- 
fers. We  cannot  save  or  help  him  by  any 
119 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

kind  of  mere  class  legislation.  It  is  not  to 
his  advantage  to  make  him  dependent,  to 
abridge  his  powers  of  self-help,  or  to  take 
away  his  liberty  of  action  as  long  as  he  does 
not  injure  others.  We  help  him  most  when 
we  leave  him  free  to  pass  out  of  any  class 
to  which  he  may  temporarily  belong,  when 
we  inspire  him  with  the  idea  of  self-de- 
pendence, and  when  we  secure  to  him  the 
possession  of  what  by  his  industry,  skill,  or 
enterprise  he  may  honestly  acquire.  Let 
us  help  him,  certainly,  if  he  needs  help ;  but 
not  delude  him  with  the  error  that  more  is 
rightly  coming  to  him  than  he  has  ever 
earned,  nor  frighten  him  with  the  dread  that 
he  can  never  come  to  his  own.  For  sympa- 
thy, charity,  good  example,  and  unselfish 
public  service  there  will  always  be  room ;  but 
for  the  suppression  of  native  powers,  for 
public  dictation  based  on  arbitrary  rules,  for 
the  assumption  that  society  is  more  impor- 
120 


TAKING  SOUNDINGS 

tant  than  those  who  compose  it,  and  for 
the  forcible  expropriation  of  success  for  the 
relief  of  failure,  there  is  no  place  in  a  free 
republic. 


IV 

THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN 
DEMOCRACY 


IV 

THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

Is  Americanism  then  a  foredoomed  fail- 
ure? Must  we  abandon  it  for  some  new  ex- 
periment ?  Must  we  conclude  that  our  fath- 
ers were  wrong  in  their  conviction  that  the 
object  of  government  is  the  protection  of 
rights  inherent  in  human  personality,  and 
also  in  the  belief  that  a  written  compact  in 
this  sense  can  afford  them  a  satisfactory 
safeguard?  Is  it  true,  as  has  been  so  often 
predicted,  that  American  Democracy,  like 
other  forms  of  Democracy,  will  ultimately 
show  itself  to  be  essentially  weak  and  fluctu- 
ating; that  it  cannot  live  up  to  an  ethical 
standard;  and  that,  by  seeking  the  basis  of 
public  authority  in  the  individuals  who 
compose  the  nation,  it  must  at  last  be 
125 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

rent    asunder    by    their    conflicting    pas- 
sions? 

Is  not  the  logical  inference  rather  that 
it  is  only  in  the  American  type  of  Democ- 
racy, as  that  is  embodied  in  our  Federal  Con- 
stitution, that  any  rational  hope  may  be 
found  of  a  permanently  peaceful  organiza- 
tion of  society  in  which  human  rights  will 
find  a  guarantee  ?  The  revolt  against  consti- 
tutional principles  and  the  basing  of  public 
authority  on  the  unqualified  popular  will 
ends,  as  we  have  seen,  in  a  proposal  of  secret 
arming  and  a  resort  to  violence.  Is  it  not 
evident  that,  where  there  is  no  sense  of  per- 
sonal duty,  no  acceptance  of  universally 
obligatory  ethical  principles  which  majori- 
ties as  well  as  minorities  must  obey,  there 
is  no  ground  of  permanence  in  a  democratic 
form  of  government?  And  if  there  is  no 
standard  of  conduct  but  that  of  predominant 
"will" — as  the  unregulated  expression  of 
126 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

what  the  greater  number  of  persons  from 
time  to  time  think  they  would  most  enjoy — 
is  there  in  Democracy  any  quality  by  virtue 
of  which  it  can  prove  its  superiority  over 
that  Imperialism  against  which  it  persist- 
ently declaims,  but  which  it  imitates  in  claim- 
ing the  right  to  rule  merely  because  it  pos- 
sesses the  power  to  do  so? 

THE  TEST  OF  DEMOCRACY  AS  A  THEORY 

Unless  Democracy  can  rid  itself,  as  it  has 
in  the  American  conception  of  the  State,  of 
the  obsession  that  those  who  possess  "sover- 
eignty" thereby  enjoy  the  right  to  exercise 
unlimited  public  authority,  it  cannot  suc- 
cessfully debate  in  the  forum  of  sound  rea- 
soning its  superiority  over  its  great  rival  as 
a  form  of  human  government.  If  it  agrees 
with  its  antagonist  that  there  are  no  inher- 
ent personal  rights  which  it  may  not  over- 
127 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ride,  and  that  the  only  rights  it  will  respect 
are  those  bestowed  by  its  own  legislation, 
does  it  not  by  that  concession  undermine  and 
forfeit  its  own  rightful  authority  to  legis- 
late? For  how  can  it  be  maintained  that 
a  prerogative  that  belongs  only  to  dominant 
power  is  rendered  more  authoritative  by  pre- 
ponderant numbers  than  it  may  be  rendered 
by  preponderant  force  of  any  other  kind? 

Absolute  Democracy,  basing  its  authority 
upon  a  process  of  counting  units  which,  as 
it  claims,  connote  no  natural  rights,  has 
no  solid  ground  for  its  pretension  to  be  the 
originator  of  rights;  for  these,  in  any  sense 
worthy  of  the  respect  of  a  rational  intelli- 
gence, cannot  be  evolved  from  mere  arbi- 
trary decrees.  By  denying,  or  disallowing, 
the  inherent  rights  of  a  minority,  and  at  the 
same  time  asserting  that  all  rights  are  cre- 
ated by  the  legislation  of  the  majority,  it 
entirely  cuts  away  the  ground  from  under 
128 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

its  own  feet,  and  leaves  without  any  logical 
foundation  its  own  right  to  legislate.  If, 
on  the  contrary,  it  bases  its  right  to  legislate 
on  the  inherent  rights  of  personality,  it  is 
bound  to  recognize  rights  antecedent  to  leg- 
islation which  it  cannot  deny.  Constitutional 
Democracy,  the  form  of  Democracy  which 
has  hitherto  prevailed  in  the  United  States, 
is  at  least  consistent  in  theory.  By  seeking 
its  foundation  in  human  personality,  it 
makes  an  appeal  to  universal  reason  and  not 
to  preponderant  force,  in  whatever  form  it 
may  be  measured. 

THE  REAL  PROBLEM  OF  GOVERNMENT 

In  America  men  have  rarely  doubted  that 
**life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness" 
are  inalienable  human  rights,  which  govern- 
ment must  respect.  It  has  been  generally 
recognized  that  the  deepest  problem  of  gov- 
10  129 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ernment  is  to  find  the  true  harmony  between 
the  inherent  rights  of  the  individual  and  the 
authority  of  the  State;  for,  unless  the  State 
possesses  a  certain  measure  of  authority, 
there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  government. 
In  our  search  for  the  source  of  this  authority 
we  postulate  "sovereignty,"  which  we  con- 
ceive of  as  inherent  in  the  people.  In  so 
far  as  we  understand  by  it  a  right  of  the 
people  to  organize  and  maintain  the  means 
for  their  own  protection,  its  existence,  like 
that  of  other  inherent  rights,  is  axiomatic; 
but,  if  it  be  regarded  as  a  right  so  tran- 
scendent that  it  may  override  all  other  rights, 
we  shall  have  difficulty  in  establishing  its  ex- 
istence. If  it  is  in  its  nature  absolute  and 
unlimited,  it  could  sweep  away  and  efface 
entirely  everything  that  opposed  it.  This, 
in  fact,  is  the  pretension  of  Absolute  De- 
mocracy; and  in  this  it  differs  from  Imperi- 
alism only  in  the  assumption  that  the  right 
130 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

to  impose  arbitrary  requirements  belongs 
to  everyone  who  is  capable  of  doing  it  rather 
than  to  a  single  dominant  person  claiming 
to  possess  exclusive  imperial  authority. 

To  elective  Imperialism  this  type  of  De- 
mocracy can  raise  no  valid  objection;  for, 
if  unlimited  power  belongs  to  the  people, 
it  may,  with  their  assent,  be  delegated  to  a 
single  depository.  And  this  is  the  conclu- 
sion at  which  this  kind  of  Democracy  usu- 
ally arrives.  It  places  responsibility  for  ac- 
tion in  the  hands  of  a  single  man.  Every 
imperial  throne  that  has  been  erected  since 
the  Roman  Republic  was  transformed  into 
the  Roman  Empire  has  been  based  upon 
the  assumed  assent  of  the  people.  And  in 
every  instance  this  termination  of  popular 
commotion  has  been  accompanied  by  a  sense 
of  relief  and  satisfaction;  for,  as  Edmund 
Burke  remarked,  in  his  "Reflections  on  the 
French  Revolution";  "In  a  democracy  the 
131 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

majority  of  citizens  is  capable  of  exercising 
the  most  cruel  oppression  upon  the  minority, 
whenever  strong  divisdons  prevail  in  that 
kind  of  policy,  as  they  often  must;  and  that 
oppression  of  the  minority  will  extend  to 
far  greater  numbers,  and  will  be  carried  on 
with  greater  fury,  than  can  almost  ever  be 
apprehended  from  the  domination  of  a  single 
scepter.  In  such  a  popular  persecution  in- 
dividual sufferers  are  in  a  much  more  de- 
plorable condition  than  in  any  other.  Under 
a  cruel  prince  they  have  at  least  the  balmy 
compassion  of  mankind  to  assuage  the  smart 
of  their  wounds;  .  .  .  but  those  who  are 
subjected  to  wrongs  under  multitudes  are 
deprived  of  external  consolations ;  they  seem 
deserted  by  mankind  and  overpowered  by  a 
conspiracy  of  their  own  species," 


132 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 
RESPONSIBILITY  IN  A  TRUE  DEMOCRACY 

It  is  clear  that  the  citizen  must  accept  and 
obey  some  form  of  public  authority;  but  it 
is  equally  clear  that  public  authority  must 
consent  to  limit  itself  before  it  goes  so  far 
as  to  invade  the  sanctuary  of  the  personal 
freedom  that  is  essential  to  individual  re- 
sponsibility. 

The  true  solution  is  found  in  the  Amer- 
ican conception  of  the  State,  and  in  this 
voluntary  self -limitation  of  power  lies  the 
true  foundation  of  Democracy.  In  this  sys- 
tem the  citizen,  being  free,  is  himself  re- 
sponsible for  government.  He  is  a  con- 
stituent, and  not  a  mere  subject,  of  the  State. 
He  acts  through  representatives  whom  he 
believes  to  be  competent  to  deliberate  wisely 
and  conclude  justly;  but,  in  any  case,  they 
are  his  representatives,  and  are  subject  to 
his  approbation  or  disapprobation.  The 
133 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

government,  whatever  it  is,  is  his  govern- 
ment. If  it  be  good,  he  must  see  that  it  is 
preserved  and  continued.  If  it  be  bad,  he 
must  see  that  it  is  reformed  or  discontinued. 
Whatever  it  is,  he  can  never  justly  blame 
it.     He  can  only  blame  himself. 

DEMOCRACY  VERSUS   IMPERIALISM 

This  constitutional  idea  of  the  limited 
powers  of  government,  and  this  alone,  is 
really  antithetical  to  Imperialism,  whose 
watchword  is  unlimited  power.  Imperialism 
does  not  inquire  or  exhort,  it  commands  and 
compels.  It  wants  nothing  of  its  subject 
but  abject  submission  and  obedience.  He  is 
not,  in  its  conception,  a  constituent  of  the 
State.  He  possesses  no  inherent  rights.  He 
can  claim  as  his  rights  only  what  govern- 
ment accords  to  him. 

Who,  then,  is  the  government?  The  man 
134 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

who  is  in  power  and  has  the  force  to  remain 
in  power.  In  the  imperial  formula,  "The 
will  of  the  prince  is  law."  Authority,  in 
this  conception  of  it,  does  not  proceed  from 
any  source  of  responsibility  toward  men. 
The  prince  may  be  responsible  to  God,  but 
not  to  man.  He  renders  an  account  to  no 
one.  For  the  subject  his  decision  is  final. 
To  escape  it,  he  must  overpower  and  de- 
stroy a  system  sustained  by  a  horde  of  pen- 
sioners upon  it;  but  the  chances  are  that,  if 
he  resists  it,  it  will  first  overpower  and  de- 
stroy him. 

THE  IRRESPONSIBILITY  OF  MAJORITY 
ABSOLUTISM 

Quite  as  completely  as  the  prince,  the  om- 
nipotent majority,  unrestrained  by  any  fun- 
damental compact,  is  devoid  of  responsibil- 
ity. It  may,  in  concrete  instances,  limit  its 
action  by  its  own  private  sense  of  propriety ; 
135 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

but  this  is  not  in  any  way  binding  upon  it, 
and  is  purely  voluntary.  It  is  governed  by 
no  superior  law,  and  is  accountable  to  no  one. 
It  may  treat  the  individuals  belonging  to  the 
minority  as  it  pleases.  It  may  strip  thera 
of  their  possessions  and  distribute  them  to 
others.  It  may  impose  its  own  arbitrary 
limitations  upon  their  daily  lives  in  what- 
ever manner  it  prefers.  It  may  prescribe 
their  daily  tasks  and  compel  them  to  per- 
form them.  In  short,  it  may,  if  it  pleases, 
reduce  them  to  slavery. 

It  is  probable  that  in  an  intelligent  so- 
ciety even  an  omnipotent  majority  would 
not  do  all  of  these  things,  and  it  is  equally 
probable  that  an  intelligent  prince  would  not 
do  them.  But,  unless  intelligence  sufficiently 
controlled  a  community  to  induce  it  to  set 
some  limits  by  law  to  its  powers  of  legisla- 
tion, it  could  hardly  be  trusted  in  the  exer- 
cise of  its  powers.  A  people  so  pure,  so  just, 
136 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

and  so  unselfish  as  never  to  be  moved  by  its 
passions  would  hardly  require  a  government. 
It  would  be  self-regulative  without  law. 

The  plea  for  absolute  majority  rule  and 
for  the  abrogation  of  fundamental  law  is 
made  upon  the  ground  that  it  is  necessary 
to  remedy  abuses.  It  is  directed  against  the 
alleged  control  of  legislation  by  minorities. 
But  why  is  legislation  ever  controlled  by 
minorities?  If  it  is,  is  it  not  because  of 
the  indifference  or  incapacity  of  majorities? 
We  now  have  nominating  primaries,  but  it 
is  rarely  the  case  that  real  majorities  nomi- 
nate. The  truth  is:  nothing  is  so  difficult 
as  to  induce  citizens  to  give  attention  to  their 
political  duties.  If  constitutional  restraints 
were  removed,  there  is  no  assurance  that 
laws  would  be  made  by  majorities,  even  with 
the  universal  adoption  of  the  initiative  and 
the  referendum.  Law^s  would  be  passed 
by  those  who  were  interested  in  passing 
137 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

them,  and  there  would  be  no  one  to  hold 
responsible.  They  would  often  be  conflict- 
ing and  impracticable,  and  their  effects 
sometimes  disastrous. 

JUST  GOVERNMENT   ESSENTIALLY 
SELF-LIMITING 

It  IS  by  no  means  possible  to  insure  human 
wisdom,  but  it  is  possible  to  abridge  human 
folly.  The  value  of  constitutional  limita- 
tions lies  in  this  possibility.  A  constitution 
is  to  a  State  what  conscience  is  to  human 
character.  It  distinguishes  between  that 
which  is  fundamentally  right  and  that  which 
is  fundamentally  wrong  By  curbing  om- 
nipotence it  directs  legislation  into  a  channel 
of  social  utility.  It  makes  the  individual  re- 
sponsible for  obedience  to  the  law,  and  the 
legislator  amenable  to  deliberately  estab- 
lished standards  of  justice.  Both  must  give 
an  account  of  themselves  before  competent 
138 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

judges,  whose  function  it  is  to  see  that  jus- 
tice, and  not  arbitrary  power,  shall  prevail. 
We  perceive,  therefore,  that  just  govern- 
ment must  be  essentially  self-limiting.  An 
omnipotent  Democracy  is  merely  a  complex 
form  of  Imperialism,  because  it  is  irrespon- 
sible. We  have,  in  truth,  to  choose  between 
Democracy  in  which  a  self-limiting  sover- 
eignty issues  from  the  composite  will  of  the 
people  organizing  themselves  under  respon- 
sible government,  and  Imperialism  in  which 
sovereignty  disregards  the  will  and  the  rights 
of  the  people  as  constituents  of  the  State, 
and  issues  its  decrees  for  its  own  purpose, 
acknowledging  no  accountability  to  any 
human  being. 

THE  CONFLICT  BETWEEN  DEMOCRACY  AND 
IMPERIALISM 

Now  that  which  gives  to  these  abstract 
statements  a  general  interest  is  that,  if  there 
139 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

is  to  be  any  orderly  and  peaceable  relation 
between  the  nations  of  the  earth,  and  any 
legal  organization  of  the  world,  one  or  the 
other  of  these  solutions  has  to  be  accepted 
as  the  means  by  which  it  is  to  be  established 
and  maintained.  We,  in  America,  believe 
in  Democracy.  But  the  important  question 
is :  Can  Democracy  stand  the  test  that  is  now 
applied  to  it?  Has  it  the  virtue,  the  cour- 
age, and  the  efficiency,  to  insure  its  own 
safety  and  preserve  its  own  existence  in  the 
struggle  for  life? 

Of  the  two  rival  methods  of  establishing 
peace,  order,  and  justice  in  the  world,  the 
more  ancient  and  the  more  fully  tried  is  Im- 
perialism. The  more  recent  and  the  less 
tested  is  Democracy.  Both  imply  the  neces- 
sity of  some  kind  of  ethical  standard;  for 
both  aim  in  some  degree  at  justice,  and 
both  hold  up  for  acceptance  the  idea  of 
duty.  But  the  postulates  that  underlie  these 
140 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

methods  are  not  only  different,  they  are 
contradictory. 

Imperialism  assumes  that  the  individual 
as  a  member  of  society  is  a  creation  of  the 
State.  Without  it  he  would  be  a  savage. 
Existing  in  its  own  right,  the  State  should 
expand  as  far  as  possible  its  jurisdiction  and 
its  power;  and,  knowing  no  limits,  it  should 
aim  to  be  universal. 

Democracy,  on  the  other  hand,  regards 
the  State  as  a  sum  of  legalized  relations  in- 
stituted for  the  benefit  of  the  individuals 
who  compose  it.  It  concedes  the  equal  right 
of  other  groups  of  men  to  establish  and  to 
change  their  forms  of  government.  Finally, 
it  places  the  happiness  and  prosperity  of  the 
individual  above  the  power  and  glory  of 
the  State.  It  is,  therefore,  in  perma- 
nent conflict  with  Imperialism;  for  it  pro- 
ceeds upon  a  diametrically  opposite  assump- 
tion. 

141 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE    STRENGTH    OF    IMPERIALISM 

Unless  it  is  possible  to  organize  all  na- 
tions under  one  central  empire — which  his- 
tory teaches  us  is  incapable  of  achievement 
— if  the  various  races  and  classes  of  men 
are  ever  to  dwell  together  in  peace  and  amity 
under  definite  forms  of  law,  federated  for 
the  maintenance  of  international  justice,  yet 
without  the  extinction  of  nationality,  the 
task  will  have  to  be  accomplished  by  De- 
mocracy ;  for,  so  long  as  the  State  is  regarded 
as  existing  for  itself,  it  will  not  and  cannot 
submit  to  limitations  of  what  it  conceives 
to  be  its  sovereign  rights.  Empires  do  not 
federate,  they  struggle  for  supremacy. 

There  is,  nevertheless,  in  Imperialism  an 
element  of  strength  and  endurance  which 
Democracy  cannot  readily  emulate.  If  the 
acquisition  of  national  wealth  and  power, 
the  most  complete  efficiency  of  the  social 
142 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

organism,  the  most  perfect  security  against 
foreign  aggression,  the  certainty  of  food, 
and  drink,  and  shelter — in  short,  the  purely 
material  aspects  of  human  existence — are 
the  main  objects  of  government,  then  the 
absolute  domination  of  a  wise  ruler  over  an 
extended  territory  may  be  preferable  to  in- 
dividual freedom  and  the  responsibility  that 
goes  with  it. 

No  one  can  question  the  advantage  of 
vigorous  captaincy,  of  strict  discipline,  and 
of  submission  to  authority,  in  any  struggle 
that  depends  upon  united  action.  The  indi- 
vidual may  wholly  lose  his  power  of  self- 
direction,  but  he  will  gain  larger  spoils  by 
united  effort  under  the  command  of  a  su- 
perior.   As  Kipling  has  expressed  it: 

Now  this  is  the  law  of  the  jungle — 

As  old  and  as  true  as  the  sky; 
And  the  wolf  that  shall  keep  it  may  prosper, 
143 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

But  the  wolf  that  shall  break  it  must  die. 
As  the  creeper  that  girdles  the  tree  front. 

The  law  runneth  forward  and  back — 
For  the  strength  of  the  pack  is  the  wolf, 

And   the   strength   of   the   wolf   is   the 
pack. 
Now  these  are  the  laws  of  the  jungle. 

And  many  and  mighty  are  they; 
But  the  head  and  the  hoof  of  the  law, 

And  the  haunch  and  the  hump  is  obey. 


WEAK  POINTS  IN  DEMOCRACY 

The  strength  of  Imperialism  consists  in 
the  full  recognition  of  the  law  of  the  jungle. 
It  is  frankly  based  on  superior  force.  But 
the  ethical  standard  disregards  mere  phys- 
ical force,  limits  itself  by  invisible  bound- 
aries, and  sets  up  law  in  the  place  of  power. 
If  Democracy  is  to  be  inspired  by  it,  it  must 
dedicate  all  its  strength  to  justice,  consent 
to  make  sacrifices,  and  in  some  degree  to 
144 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

forego  efficiency  in  order  to  acquire  moral 
dignity. 

The  weakness  of  Democracy  is,  therefore, 
apparent.  It  recognizes  rights  in  others 
which  it  will  not  for  its  own  advantage  con- 
sent to  take  away,  believing  that  these  rights 
are  inherent  in  personality  and,  therefore, 
inalienable.  Imperialism  is  less  scrupulous. 
It  knows  no  duty  but  duty  to  the  State, 
which  it  imposes  ruthlessly  upon  every  indi- 
vidual. There  are,  in  this  conception,  no 
rights  that  are  not  the  gifts  of  governments. 
Hence  Imperialism  knows  no  law  but  its 
own  will.  It  follows  the  path  that  leads  to 
success.  It  can  promote  science,  develop 
industry,  ^extend  commerce,  and  organize 
armies,  without  consulting  its  subjects. 
Their  province  is  simply  to  obey. 

Democracy  can  do  none  of  these  things. 
It  must  propose,  debate,  persuade,  convince, 
and  wait  for  the  answer  to  its  referendum. 
11  145 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

And  while  it  is  doing  this,  Imperiahsm,  al- 
ways provident,  alwa5^s  watchful,  always 
ready,  strikes  the  fatal  blow. 

All  this  is  true  of  the  purest  and  noblest 
type  of  Democracy,  but  Democracy  is  not 
always  of  this  type.  In  a  Democracy,  men 
are  likely  to  think  constantly  of  themselves, 
of  their  so-called  "rights,"  but  only  in  crises 
or  at  intervals  of  the  State,  and  of  their 
duty  to  the  State;  so  that,  in  emergencies, 
they  open  their  eyes  with  surprise  when  re- 
quired to  make  sacrifices  for  the  State,  and 
especially  when  called  upon  to  defend  it. 

IS  DEMOCRACY  AN  IMPEDIMENT  TO  DUTY? 

And  it  is  just  here  that  Democracy  has  to 
meet  its  crucial  test.  Have  we,  in  America, 
for  example,  the  fiber  to  meet  it? 

Lately  we  have  been  passing  through  an 
orgy  of  criticism  upon  our  own  institutions. 
146 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

They  have  been  assaulted  as  archaic,  insin- 
cere, fundamentally  dishonest,  and  unfair. 
Our  great  heroes  of  the  past,  the  founders 
of  the  nation,  even  Washington — the  purest 
patriot  and  the  most  judicious  statesman 
that  ever  lived^have  been  made  the  objects 
of  diatribe  and  censure.  The  Constitution 
has  been  reviled  as  an  anachronism,  and  the 
substitution  for  it  of  immediate  popular  deci- 
sions— without  debate,  without  reflection, 
and  without  consideration  for  the  country 
as  a  whole  but  only  of  the  assumed  inter- 
ests of  a  majority — has  been  advocated. 
People  have  sung,  "I  Did  Not  Raise  My 
Boy  to  Be  a  Soldier,"  and  they  have  ap- 
plauded peace  at  any  price.  And  what  must 
be  the  feeling  of  contempt  of  any  watchful 
imperialist  who  may  be  marking  us  out  for 
the  next  victim  in  the  game  of  empire? 

To  what  standard  are  we  prepared  to 
rally,  with  the  fixed  resolution  to  defend  it? 
147 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

To  whom  may  we  look  as  a  leader,  a  knight 
without  fear  and  without  reproach,  whose 
call  we  may  follow  even  unto  death?  Alas 
for  Democracy,  if  it  comes  to  the  conclusion 
that  its  principles  are  not  worth  dying  for, 
and  that  its  chiefs  cannot  be  trusted ! 

OUR  OWN  RELATION  TO  IMPERIALISM 

We  know,  all  of  us,  and  it  requires  no 
special  indictment  of  any  nation  to  prove 
it,  that  the  spirit  of  Imperialism  still  exists 
in  the  world,  that  it  is  not  confined  to  one 
nation,  that  it  is  active,  that  it  may  some- 
where be  triumphant,  or,  what  is  worse,  that 
it  may  somewhere  be  disappointed  of  its 
expectations,  without  being  extinguished, 
and  look  for  new  fields  of  conquest.  Some 
day  we  may  have  to  resist  the  intrusion  of 
it  into  our  own  sphere  of  responsibility;  and 
what  shall  we  do  then?  Shall  we  remain 
passive,  or  shall  we  act? 
148 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

We  know  further  that  the  greatest  dan- 
ger of  all  is  the  attempt  to  amalgamate  the 
spirit  of  Imperialism  with  the  spirit  of  De- 
mocracy; for  this  would  probably  result  in 
the  triumph  of  Imperialism  in  our  own  re- 
public and  the  sapping  of  the  virtues  of  the 
democratic  ideal.  The  truth  is  that  there 
is  a  deadly  incompatibility  in  the  effort  to 
serve  two  masters.  If  we  really  aim  at  em- 
pire, it  is  suicidal  to  cultivate  Democracy. 
If  we  love  Democracy,  we  must  renounce 
the  spirit  of  conquest  and  world  domination. 
The  two  currents,  coming  together,  serve 
to  weaken  the  national  energies  and  to  para- 
lyze the  body  politic. 

THE  BRITISH   EXAMPLE 

Great  Britain  has  tried  that  experiment, 
and  the  lesson  should  not  be  lost.    Take,  for 
example,  the  swing  of  the  pendulum  between 
149 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Imperialism  and  Democracy  during  the 
dominance  of  their  great  protagonists,  Dis- 
raeli and  Gladstone — the  result  of  the  twor 
party  system,  in  which  the  roles  of  these  two 
great  leaders  might  conceivably  have  been 
interchanged;  for  each  was  under  the  po- 
litical necessity  of  opposing  the  other.  The 
one  aimed  at  foreign  expansion  and  world 
domination,  crippling  or  impeding  the  prog- 
ress and  ambitions  of  other  nations,  secur- 
ing points  of  advantage  for  colonies  or  naval 
bases  in  every  part  of  the  globe,  guarding 
Gibraltar,  controlling  the  Suez  Canal,  con- 
tending with  Russia  in  India  and  Persia, 
and  with  the  rest  of  Europe  in  Africa.  The 
other  labored  for  electoral  reform,  urging 
ecclesiastical  disestablishment,  proposing 
home  rule  in  Ireland,  undoing  Disraeli's, 
compacts  with  the  Boers,  calling  off  the  con- 
flict in  Afghanistan,  extending  sympathy 
to  the  Armenians — but,  sad  to  recall,  more 
150 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

interested  in  the  cotton  weavers  of  Man- 
chester than  in  the  suppression  of  slavery 
in  the  United  States. 

And  now  see  the  fruits  of  this  double  pol- 
icy in  England.  A  democracy,  no  doubt, 
but  an  imperial  democracy.  A  democracy 
that  accords  every  inherent  right  to  an  Eng- 
lishman, but  an  empire  that  claims  suprem- 
acy on  the  sea  and  subordination  to  its  will 
everywhere  where  it  can  be  exercised.  Has 
not  British  Imperialism  evoked  in  other  na- 
tions a  spirit  that  British  Democracy  is  now 
struggling  to  allay? 

THE   DEMOCRATIC   IDEAL 

I  mean  to  throw  no  weight  into  the  scale 
of  the  world  conflict  now  raging.  I  speak 
only  as  an  American  to  Americans.  And 
my  message  is  this :  that  there  is  an  inherent 
opposition  between  Imperialism  and  De- 
151 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

mocracy;  that  if  we  say  the  State  exists  for 
the  individual,  in  order  that  he  may  reach 
his  highest  development  of  reason,  con- 
science, personal  freedom,  and  responsibil- 
ity, and  that  the  individual  does  not  owe 
body  and  soul  to  the  ambitions  of  the  State, 
then  we  must  agree  that  every  people,  every- 
where, capable  of  organizing  and  maintain- 
ing a  responsible  government,  should  be  per- 
mitted to  do  so,  to  possess  and  to  rule  in 
their  own  land,  and  must  be  held  accountable 
for  their  conduct  on  land  and  sea,  in  ac- 
cordance with  just  and  uniform  laws  of  in- 
ternational comity  and  principles  of  hu- 
manity. 

I  know  very  well  that,  in  the  present  con- 
dition of  mankind,  this  program  is  difficult 
to  realize;  for  there  is,  besides  Imperialism 
and  Democracy,  a  third  factor  that  enters 
into  the  making  of  history;  and  that  is  an- 
archy. 

152 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

What  is  to  be  done  where  that  condition 
reigns,  as  it  does  today  in  Mexico?  And 
yet,  the  effort  to  suppress  it  may  be  re- 
garded as  a  manifestation  of  the  imperial 
spirit  and  the  suppression  of  democratic 
ideals.  And  all  this  only  shows  how  difficult 
is  the  task  of  true  statesmanship. 

THE  TEST  OF  OUR  OWN  DEMOCRACY 

But,  certainly,  we  cannot  be  true  to  our 
democratic  ideal,  unless  we  are  prepared,  at 
whatever  cost,  to  defend  it,  with  all  that  it 
implies.  Can  Democracy  endure  this  test? 
Can  we  frame  an  international  policy  that 
we  can  defend  before  the  bar  of  reason  and 
conscience;  and  then,  with  loyalty  and  re- 
gardless of  sacrifices,  carry  it  into  execution? 

The  first  requirement  of  such  a  policy  is 
to  avoid  any  mixture  of  Imperialism  in  our 
own  conduct.  We  have  shown  our  ability 
153 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

to  do  this  in  the  case  of  Cuba ;  and  we  shall 
show  ourselves  capable  of  it,  I  believe,  in 
every  instance ;  but  there  are  responsibilities 
that  we  cannot  disregard.  We  cannot  aban- 
don to  internal  anarchy  or  external  subju- 
gation any  people  over  whom  the  aegis  of 
our  protection  has  been  extended. 

It  is  to  the  test  of  strength  and  purity 
that  Democracy  must  be  brought,  and  it  is 
to  this  test  that  I  should  like  to  bring  every 
one  of  my  fellow-citizens  throughout  the  na- 
tion. Is  Democracy  worth  what  it  may  cost 
to  defend  it?  Are  we  ready  to  pay  the 
price?  Have  we  the  virility,  the  courage, 
and  the  spirit  of  sacrifice;  but,  above  all, 
have  we  the  wisdom  to  unite  all  our  strength 
and  dedicate  all  our  powers  to  the  ideals  by 
which  we  have  lived? 


154 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 
THE  TRIUMPH  OF  DEMOCRACY 

Such  questions  as  these  have  been  asked 
before,  and  they  have  been  triumphantly  an- 
swered. In  July,  1861,  President  Lincoln, 
in  an  hour  of  desperate  peril  for  this  nation, 
and,  as  he  said,  "for  the  whole  family  of 
man,"  asked  the  question:  "Is  there,  in  all 
republics,  this  inherent  and  fatal  weakness? 
Must  a  government  of  necessity  be  too 
strong  for  the  liberties  of  its  own  people,  or 
too  weak  to  maintain  its  own  existence?" 

We  know  what  the  answer  was.  And  the 
answer,  in  the  end,  will  always  be  the  same. 
It  is  not  its  Imperialism,  but  its  Democracy, 
that  will  save  the  British  Empire,  if  that 
Empire  is  to  be  saved.  Its  safety  lies  not 
in  its  imperial  authority,  but  in  its  demo- 
cratic rule.  It  is  the  spirit  of  Gladstone, 
and  not  the  spirit  of  Disraeli,  that  it  must 
now  invoke.  Canada,  Australia,  New  Zea- 
155 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

land.  South  Africa,  and  even  India  do  not 
rally  to  the  trumpet  call  of  imperial  com- 
mand alone,  but  far  more  to  the  instinct  of 
democratic  self-preservation  as  self-govern- 
ing colonies. 

And  if  America  is  to  be  saved,  it  will  not 
be  by  American  Imperialism.  It  will  be 
by  the  thought  that  anyone  who  strikes  at 
the  life,  or  takes  away  unjustly  the  property, 
of  any  American  citizen,  strikes  at  you  and 
at  me,  even  though  we  be  safe  at  home,  and 
all  our  possessions  may  seem  to  be  secure. 

If  there  is  ever  to  be  a  realization  of  Ten- 
nyson's prophetic  dream  of  a  Parliament  of 
Man  and  a  Federation  of  the  World,  it  will 
be  through  Democracy — ^Democracy  assert- 
ing the  inherent  and  inalienable  rights  of 
man,  reaching  out  hands  of  mutual  helpful- 
ness wherever  rights  are  invaded,  binding 
our  American  Republics  into  a  true  fra- 
ternity based  on  the  secure  independence  of 
156 


THE  TESTS  OF  AMERICAN  DEMOCRACY 

constitutional  States,  and  welcoming  to  its 
brotherhood  all  nations  that  love  peace  and 
justice,  and  are  willing  to  be  ruled  by  equal 
laws. 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD 
POLITICS 


V 

AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

What,  then,  is  the  prospect  of  a  better  or- 
ganization of  the  world? 

Imperialism  offers  no  principle  upon 
which  the  rights  of  nations  can  be  affirmed 
and  coordinated.  As  it  recognizes  no  in- 
herent right  in  the  individual,  it  finds  none 
in  the  small  or  weak  nation  which  it,  there- 
fore, claims  the  authority  to  overrule,  to 
subjugate,  and  to  annex,  when  it  is  to  its 
interest  to  do  so. 

In  this,  Imperialism  is  sustained  by  fault- 
less logic,  to  which  Absolute  Democracy  also 
must  assent;  for,  if  rights  are  exclusively 
the  results  of  legislation,  where  there  is  no 
law  there  are  no  rights.  What  is  called  in- 
ternational law,  the  imperialist  affirms,  is 
12  161 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

not  law  in  any  true  sense;  for  it  is  not  im- 
posed by  any  supreme  authority;  is  not  en- 
forceable by  any  organized  executive  power; 
and  is,  in  fact,  nothing  more  than  an  accumu- 
lation of  customs,  to  which  have  been  added 
certain  voluntary  conventions  that  may  at 
any  time  be  withdrawn  and  annulled. 

THE  REAL  BASIS  OF  INTERNATIONAL  LAW 

It  is  worthy  of  remark,  that,  historically, 
Americanism  and  international  law  have  a 
common  origin  and  a  common  foundation. 
From  Grotius  onward,  including  all  the 
early  writers  on  the  law  of  nations,  it  is 
assumed  that  every  independent  and  re- 
sponsible State  possesses  certain  inherent 
and  inalienable  rights;  and  that  it  is  upon 
these  "natural  rights"  that  the  whole  fabric 
of  international  law  is  based.  Customs 
and  conventions,  it  is  admitted,  have  been 
162 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

developed  in  the  effort  to  secure  these  rights 
and,  in  the  future  as  in  the  past,  these  cus- 
toms will  undoubtedly  change ;  but  the  fixed 
and  immutable  principles  of  international 
law,  which  constitute  its  reason  for  exist- 
ence, and  express  the  ideals  which  it  aims 
to  realize,  are  not  the  result  of  customs  and 
conventions.  They  exist  in  their  own  right, 
as  the  embodiment  and  expression  of  the 
universal  conception  of  justice. 

The  influence  of  Imperialism,  both  in  its 
theory  and  its  practice,  has  been  to  under- 
mine this  foundation  of  international  law. 
Its  teaching  is  that  the  law  of  nature  and 
natural  rights,  on  which  the  American  con- 
ception of  the  State  and  the  theory  of  in- 
ternational law  are  founded,  should  be  no 
longer  seriously  regarded  in  the  world  of 
political  thought.  Nothing,  it  is  contended, 
can  be  accepted  as  law^  unless  it  has  been 
established  by  an  act  of  sovereign  author- 
163 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ity,  and  is  supported  by  an  effective  sanc- 
tion. What  is  called  international  law  ful- 
fills neither  of  these  conditions.  No  nation, 
therefore,  is  in  reality  bound  by  it.  Not  only 
so,  but  it  is  intrusive  and  vexatious;  for  it 
claims  the  prerogative  of  limiting  supreme 
power  and  arresting  the  development  of  a 
Sovereign  State.  The  unlimited  authority 
of  the  State  entitles  it  to  expand  indefi- 
nitely— ^territorially  and  otherwise — to  take 
possession  of  whatever  it  can  appropriate, 
and  to  hold  whatever  its  armed  force  en- 
ables it  to  retain. 


DO  INHERENT  NATIONAL  RIGHTS  EXIST? 

In  two  great  international  conferences  at 
The  Hague  the  incompatibility  of  the  Amer- 
ican and  the  imperial  conceptions  was  clearly 
brought  to  light. 

In  all  international  dealings  the  complete 
164 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

sovereignty  of  all  truly  independent  and 
responsible  States  is  ostensibly  assumed  and 
admitted ;  but  there  is,  without  doubt,  a  wide 
difference  in  the  conceptions  of  complete 
sovereignty  entertained  by  different  nations. 
Is  sovereignty  in  its  essential  nature  limited, 
or  is  it  unlimited? 

The  question  is  fundamental ;  for  upon  the 
answer  turns  the  whole  problem  as  to 
whether  there  can  exist  a  society  of  Sover- 
eign States  in  a  truly  juristic  sense. 

A  jural  society  implies  an  association  of 
equals,  mutually  recognizing  in  one  another 
the  same  relative  rights.  Unlimited  sover- 
eignty would  render  this  impossible;  for, 
by  its  very  nature,  unlimited  sovereignty 
could  not  be  divided,  and  if  it  existed  at  all 
could  be  the  exclusive  possession  of  only  one. 
It  is,  therefore,  an  empty  assumption,  with- 
out support  either  in  fact  or  in  theory.  In  a 
jural  society  members  may  differ  in  power 
165 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

and  magnitude,  for  the  reason  that  these 
do  not  constitute  the  around  of  its  existence ; 

4 

but  if  to  these  inequalities  there  be  added 
an  acknowledged  inequality  of  rights,  the 
whole  foundation  of  social  organization  is 
swept  away.  The  small  nations  then  be- 
come the  predestined  vassals  of  the  great. 

As  this  is  the  confessed  aim  of  Imperial- 
ism, it  is  not  surprising  that  it  favors  the 
feudal  rather  than  the  national  type  of 
world  organization.  Being  disposed  to  dic- 
tate the  law  to  subordinates,  it  resents  any 
law  that  is  restrictive  of  its  own  dominant 
authority.  It  does  not  desire  to  be  held 
accountable  to  anyone  for  its  conduct, 
or  to  bind  itself  by  self-limiting  engage- 
ments. 

To    Constitutional    Democracy,    on    the 

other  hand,  sovereignty  may  be  complete 

without  being  unlimited;  because  it  is,  in 

reality,  nothing  more  than  the  right  of  an  in- 

166 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

dependent  and  responsible  people  to  organ- 
ize a  government  for  its  own  protection.  It 
is,  by  its  nature,  an  ethical  and  not  a  dynam- 
ical conception.  It  is  based  upon  the  inher- 
ent rights  of  the  people,  and  not  upon  mere 
power.  It  implies  no  authority  over  others 
than  its  own  constituent  elements;  for  all 
free  men  capable  of  forming  a  responsible 
government  have  an  equal  right  to  do  so, 
and  such  a  government  cannot  deny  the  in- 
herent rights  of  another  State  without  a 
logical  denial  of  its  own. 

THE  POSSIBILITY  OF  WORLD  ORGANIZATION 

It  is  evident,  therefore,  that,  while  Im- 
perialism has  no  plan  of  world  organization, 
aside  from  its  own  universal  domination  and 
the  subordination  by  force  of  all  peoples 
to  its  will.  Constitutional  Democracy,  rec- 
ognizing the  rights  of  nations,  offers  such 
167 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

a  plan  through  the  progressive  federation 
of  self -governed  peoples. 

A  distinction  at  this  point  is,  however, 
important.  Nationality  implies  a  strict  in- 
ternal unity,  and  the  direct  action  of  cen- 
tral authority  upon  each  individual  com- 
ponent of  the  nation.  A  federal  govern- 
ment, like  that  of  the  United  States,  for 
example,  has  direct  authority  over  every 
citizen  in  every  State  in  certain  matters.  A 
general  federation  of  nations  would  not  ad- 
mit of  such  direct  action  by  a  central  au- 
thority; for  this  would  involve  the  extinc- 
tion of  nationality,  which  practically  all  na- 
tions would  resist. 

There  remains,  however,  the  possibility  of 
a  compact  less  consolidating  in  its  effects 
than  such  a  union  would  be — a  federation 
based  upon  the  acceptance  of  a  codified  law 
of  nations,  an  engagement  to  unite  in  ob- 
serving and  enforcing  it,  and  an  agreement 
168 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

to  abide  by  the  decisions  of  neutral  judges 
in  disputes  arising  under  it.  Such  a  com- 
pact would  be,  in  effect,  a  Constitution  of 
Civilization.  It  would  recognize  the  rights 
of  nationality  and  base  itself  upon  them.  It 
would  not  destroy  national  sovereignty,  in 
its  true  and  proper  sense ;  for,  while  it  would 
frankly  admit  its  necessary  limitation,  it 
would  not  lessen  its  ethical  completeness. 
Such  a  plan  would  secure  to  every  people 
the  unrestricted  right  of  self-government, 
and  furnish  to  all  nations  a  basis  for  amicable 
cooperation  in  securing  their  future  peace- 
ful development  and  common  prosperity. 

THE    IMPEDIMENTS    TO  WORLD  ORGANIZATION 

Reasonable  as  such  a  plan  may  be,  the 
hope  of  its  realization  is  obstructed  by  ex- 
isting conditions  of  which  it  is  necessary  to 
take  account ;  and  it  is  important  to  remem- 
169 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ber  that  it  is  the  passions  rather  than  the 
reason  of  men  that  have  hitherto  ruled  the 
world. 

There  was  a  time,  and  it  was  not  very- 
long  ago,  when  some  of  us  dreamed  that 
there  was  a  way  to  secure  the  rights  of  na- 
tions and  adjust  the  differences  between- 
them  without  the  use  of  armed  force.  That 
method  was  simply  an  agreement  to  bring 
their  controversies  before  a  neutral  inter- 
national tribunal  and  submit  to  the  prin- 
ciples of  justice;  but  alas!  it  has  proved  to 
be  a  dream — a  beautiful  and  inspiring 
dream,  but  none  the  less  a  vision  of  the 
mind. 

We  have  experienced  a  rude  awakening. 
We  have  learned  that  mankind  has  not  yet 
advanced  to  the  stage  of  development  where 
dependence  can  be  placed  upon  the  appeal 
to  reason.  It  is  a  sad  disillusionment,  but 
we  are  compelled  by  the  facts  to  accept  it. 
170 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

Virtue  and  innocence  are  not  yet  exempt 
from  violence.  Neither  accepted  law  nor 
solemn  treaties  and  conventions,  to  which 
the  sacred  honor  of  nations  is  pledged,  se- 
cure them  from  it.  Womanhood  and  child- 
hood, as  well  as  manhood,  are  made  its  vic- 
tims, and  we  may  read  the  dreadful  truth 
again  and  again  in  ghastly,  speechless  faces 
and  in  desecrated,  mutilated  bodies,  as  well 
as  in  ruined  towns  and  cities  and  unnum- 
bered graves. 

THE  PRESENT  BASIS   OF   NATIONAL  SECURITY 

That  which  compels  our  attention  at  this 
time  is  the  fact  that  the  whole  superstruc- 
ture of  previously  accepted  international 
law  as  embodied  in  treaties  and  conventions 
and  the  consensus  of  opinion  of  the  civilized 
world,  has  been  shaken  to  its  foundations; 
and  we  are  confronted  with  the  question, 
171 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Upon  what  does  our  national  security  de- 
pend? 

Our  first  thought  naturally  is  that  it  de- 
pends upon  our  resolute  determination  to 
avoid  being  drawn  into  war.  But  is  it  true 
that  exemption  from  war  may  be  secured 
by  a  firm  resolution  to  avoid  it?  At  the 
present  moment  all  the  Great  Powers  of 
Europe,  and  several  of  the  smaller  ones,  are 
engaged  in  a  terrific  struggle  which  all  of 
them  claim  not  to  have  desired,  and  in  which 
they  profess  to  be  unwillingly  engaged.  The 
necessary  inference  is  that  in  the  present 
political  organization  of  the  world  war  may 
be  suddenly  thrust  upon  any  peace-loving 
country,  in  spite  of  its  sincere  and  earnest 
desire  to  avoid  it.  Unless  it  is  disposed  to 
sacrifice  every  interest,  to  forego  every  priv- 
ilege, and  to  renounce  every  right — which  a 
nation  incapable  of  defending  itself  may  be 
compelled  to  do — it  must  not  only  resist 
172 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  beginnings  of  aggression,  but  must  be 
prepared  to  do  so  with  success. 

Such  preparation  is  opposed  by  those  who 
dislike  the  idea  of  armed  defense,  on  the 
ground  that  it  tends  toward  the  further  de- 
velopment of  "Militarism,"  which  is  repug- 
nant to  them.  But  what  is  it  in  "Militar- 
ism" that  is  repugnant,  if  it  is  not  the  arbi- 
trary domination  of  others,  and  the  aug- 
mentation of  force  for  this  purpose?  When, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  purpose  is  to  resist 
such  domination,  and  to  establish  and  main- 
tain a  reign  of  law,  in  opposition  to  a  reign 
of  terror,  does  not  the  opprobrium  which  the 
word  "Militarism"  is  intended  to  convey 
wholly  disappear?  Or  shall  we  carry  the 
sentiment  of  non-resistance  to  such  an  ex- 
treme as  to  condemn  altogether  the  armed 
defense  of  the  great  principles  of  equity  and 
humanity  against  arbitrary  force  and  ruth- 
less aggression? 

173 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

THE   NECESSITY  OF   NATIONAL  STRENGTH 

It  is  not  desirable,  and  happily  it  is  not 
necessaiy,  to  attempt  an  analysis  of  the 
motives  and  policies  of  the  different  govern- 
ments now  engaged  in  deadly  conflict.  Such 
an  attempt  would  inevitably  lead  to  con- 
troversy at  a  moment  when  our  supreme 
need  is  a  statement  of  facts  and  principles 
that  is  incontrovertible.  If  we  are  not  to  be 
weakened  by  division,  we  must  all  unite  in 
taking  our  stand  upon  a  foundation  so  solid 
that  it  cannot  be  shaken,  so  broad  that  it 
will  afford  room  for  every  true  American 
to  stand  upon  it,  and  so  high  that  it  will 
lift  us  all  above  race  sympathies,  sectional 
advantages,  personal  interests,  and  aU  the 
mephitic  fogs  and  mists  of  mutual  suspicion 
and  distrust. 

If  we  are  to  be  influential  at  the  council 
board  of  nations,  it  is  necessary  that  we 
174 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

should  be  strong,  and  if  we  are  to  be  strong 
it  is  essential  that  we  should  be  united.  Un- 
less we  are  ignobly  disposed  to  shrink  from 
our  duty  to  make  our  words  and  our  rights 
respected  in  the  world,  we  must  all,  with- 
out distinction  of  race  sympathies  or  party 
attachments,  ask  ourselves  what  it  is  neces- 
sary to  do  to  maintain  our  rights  as 
a  nation,  on  land  and  sea,  and  to  secure 
the  permanent  safety  of  our  free  institu- 
tions. 


AN  AMERICAN  PLATFORM   OF  PRINCIPLES 

Eliminating  from  discussion,  therefore, 
all  that  does  not  concern  us  as  a  nation,  let 
us  confine  our  attention  to  that  which  is 
vital  to  our  national  existence. 

There  are  certain  fundamental  principles 
which  all  thoughtful  American  citizens  unite 
in  accepting.  Among  these. are  the  proposi- 
175 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

tions:  that  government  should  exist  for  the 
sake  of  the  governed;  that  a  just  govern- 
ment is  based  upon  the  equal  rights  of  all 
the  people  to  life,  liberty  and  the  pursuit 
of  happiness;  that,  in  consequence,  govern- 
ments, in  their  relation  to  one  another, 
should  recognize  these  rights;  and  that  all 
governments,  with  due  respect  for  the  prin- 
ciples of  humanity,  should  regulate  theirj 
conduct  by  just  laws,  freely  accepted  and 
faithfully  observed. 

This  simple  creed  needs  no  enlargement, 
and  no  argumentative  justification.  It  is 
a  platform  of  world  politics  upon  which  all 
American  citizens,  irrespective  of  their  an- 
cestral origin  or  their  partisan  preferences, 
may  unite.  These  doctrines  are  at  once  our 
birthright  and  a  sacred  trust.  They  are 
the  lodestone  that  has  attracted  the  op- 
pressed of  all  nations  to  these  shores.  They 
have  made  us  a  great,  a  prosperous,  and  a 
176 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

mighty  people.  No  true  American  wishes 
to  withdraw  allegiance  to  them,  or  would 
hesitate  to  shed  the  last  drop  of  his  blood  in 
defense  of  them,  if  they  were  menaced  with 
destruction. 


OPPOSITION  TO  AMERICAN  PRINCIPLES 

It  has  been  our  custom, .  as  a  people,  to 
give  to  these  principles  all  possible  support 
upon  all  occasions.  We  have  done  so  in 
China,  in  Cuba,  and  in  the  Philippines, 
where  we  have  taken  in  tutelage  a  popula- 
tion in  its  political  childhood  and  conscien- 
tiously striven  to  lay  the  foundations  for  its 
future  self-government.  We  have  stood  for 
these  principles,  and  for  the  judicial  settle- 
ment of  international  differences,  in  the  two 
general  conferences  at  The  Hague.  We 
have  from  the  beginning  favored  the  exemp- 
tion from  capture  of  all  innocent  private 
13  177 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

property  at  sea,  even  the  private  property 
of  persons  belonging  to  a  belligerent  na- 
tion. Equity  and  humanity  have  been 
the  watchwords  of  our  diplomacy,  and  at 
every  opportunity  we  have  pleaded  for 
them. 

But  we  have  been  as  a  voice  crying  in 
the  wilderness.  On  one  point  or  another, 
nearly  the  whole  world  has  been  against  us ; 
and  there  is  every  prospect  that  it  will  con- 
tinue to  be  against  us  in  our  endeavor  to 
carry  out  our  entire  program  of  neutral 
rights. 

When  we  descend  from  the  realm  of 
ideals  to  the  arena  of  reality,  we  find  that 
the  rights  of  peoples  have  nowhere  been  re- 
spected, except  where  they  were  defended 
by  force  of  arms;  that  solemn  compacts  are 
everywhere  imperiled  by  the  lust  for  con- 
quest; that  weakness  and  wealth  are  every- 
where the  designated  prey  of  depredation; 
178 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

that  even  alleged  democracies  are  sometimes 
inspired  by  predatory  instincts;  that  whole 
empires  have  been  built  up  of  territorial  loot ; 
and  that  "government  of  the  people,  for 
the  people,  and  by  the  people"  exists  only 
where  it  is  well  defended.  The  one  active, 
aggressive  principle  in  world  politics  is  the 
spirit  of  Imperialism.  It  has  raised  its  flag 
upon  every  island  of  every  sea  and  ocean. 
It  has  partitioned  Africa  and  converted  it 
into  a  patchwork  of  European  colonies.  It 
has  prepared  new  maps  of  Asia  and  even  of 
America,  and  only  withholds  them  from  pub- 
lication until  the  troops  shall  have  taken 
possession.  Its  watchword  is  "dominion" — 
dominion  by  whatever  means  may  be  needed 
to  make  it  possible.  Its  tentacles  are  battle- 
ships and  expeditionary  forces  that  seize  the 
prey  which  forts  and  garrisons  afterward 
render  digestible. 


179 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 
THE   LEAGUE   TO    ENFORCE    PEACE 

Before  the  outbreak  of  the  present  world 
conflict,  it  was  difficult,  even  in  the  face  of 
the  palpable  evidence,  to  make  honest  men  in 
America  believe  this.  Even  now  our  paci- 
fist friends  accept  with  reluctance  the  un- 
palatable truth.  But  they  are  at  last  be- 
ginning to  realize  that  the  appetite  for 
dominion  and  the  ideals  of  justice  are  still 
in  conflict;  and  that,  in  the  presence  of  42- 
centimeter  cannon,  machine  guns,  en- 
trenched riflemen,  and  the  tempest  of  deadly 
gases,  their  reasoning,  however  logical,  is 
ineffectual.  The  most  earnest  among  them 
have  come  to  the  unexpected  conclusion 
that,  if  peace  is  to  prevail  upon  the  earth, 
arbitrary  resort  to  violence  must  be  re- 
strained by  organized  armed  resistance. 

The  present  phase  of  pacifist  evolution  is 
embodied  in  the  "League  to  Enforce 
180 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

Peace";  that  is,  to  impose  and  compel  it  by 
force  of  arms. 

Regarded  in  the  abstract,  the  proposal  is 
plausible.  It  is,  however,  plainly  a  retreat 
from  the  position  that  universal  peace  can 
be  attained,  in  the  present  condition  of  the 
world,  by  mere  treaties  and  conventions.  It 
is  a  recognition  of  the  fact  that  peace-loving 
peoples  have  no  other  security  against  ag- 
gression than  their  means  of  armed  defense. 
A  union  of  their  forces  for  the  maintenance 
of  international  justice  would,  undoubtedly, 
be  of  great  utility;  but  the  project  involves 
considerations  which  require  to  be  carefully 
examined. 

THE    INCOMPATIBILITY   OF    IMPERIALISM   AND 
DEMOCRACY 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  the  imperial  and 
the  democratic  conceptions  of  international 
relations  are  fundamentally  different,  is  it 
181 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

possible  for  these  two  elements  to  unite  for 
the  enforcement  of  peace  ?  Empires  and  re- 
publics may,  indeed,  enter  into  offensive  and 
defensive  alliances,  in  which  they  bind  them- 
selves to  act  together  where  their  common  in- 
terests are  affected;  but  can  they  agree  to 
make  war  upon  each  other  in  case  either  of 
them  fails  to  postpone  action  for  a  year 
while  a  dispute  or  an  insult  is  under  con- 
sideration? Is  it  probable  that  any  imperial 
Power,  seeing  its  plans  frustrated  by  another 
Power,  would  tamely  submit  the  question  at 
issue  to  arbitration,  or  await  the  advice  of 
neutral  judges  whose  conclusion  was  likely 
to  be  adverse?  Would  it  give  its  antagonist 
a  year  in  which  to  prepare  for  opposing  it 
in  case  the  verdict  should  finally  be  that  it 
was  entitled  to  vindicate  its  position  by  force 
of  arms?  An  affirmative  answer  to  these 
questions  would  involve  the  assumption  that 
the  imperialistic  conception  of  the  State  is 
182 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

to   be   suddenly   abandoned — of   which   we 
have  not  the  slightest  evidence. 

Is  it,  on  the  other  hand,  presumable,  that 
a  republic  would  act  wisely  if  it  subordi- 
nated its  own  judgment  to  the  decision  of 
imperial  Powers;  or,  if  it  entered  into  a 
compact  with  them  to  engage  in  future  wars 
without  knowing  beforehand  what  they 
might  involve;  much  less,  if  it  entirely  sur- 
rendered its  own  means  of  self-defense  by 
placing  itself  under  the  protection  of  an  in- 
ternational army  that  might,  through  some 
perversion  of  justice,  act  against  it? 


THE  RELATION  OF  PEACE  TO  JUSTICE 

But  there  is  another  consideration  upon 
which  it  is  necessary  to  reflect  in  cherishing 
the  aspiration  of  universal  peace.  It  is  that 
universal  peace  is  an  abstract  idea  that  has 
no  moral  value  apart  from  concrete  ques- 
183 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

tions  of  right  and  wrong,  which  this  pro- 
posal admits  cannot  in  every  instance  be  set- 
tled without  preponderant  force.  What  na- 
tion can  be  expected  to  set  up  as  its  highest 
ideal  the  mere  negative  notion  of  universal 
peace,  until  its  liberty  is  achieved,  until  it 
no  longer  needs  to  be  defended,  or  while 
the  rights  of  humanity  are  anj'ivhere  tram- 
pled in  the  dust?  Such  a  decision  would 
leave  the  world  a  victim  to  every  outrage, 
and  mark  the  abject  degeneration  of  man- 
kind. 

No,  there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  uni- 
versal peace  until  there  is  universal  justice 
in  the  world ;  and  there  ought  not  to  be. 

What  we  American  citizens  need  to  be 
thinking  about  is,  not  how  to  pacify  the 
world — ^which  will  go  on  fighting  as  long 
as  there  is  something  wrong  to  fight  about — 
but  how  to  show  the  world  that  there  is  at 
least  one  country  where  the  ideal  of  human 
184 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

rights  is  placed  above  passive  acquiescence 
in  the  demands  of  brute  force,  and  that  there 
is  one  citizenship  that  carries  with  it  a  na- 
tional protection  that  must  be  reckoned  with. 


THE  RELATION  OF  PEACE  TO  FORCE 

One  thing  is  certain.  Peace  can  never 
be  insured  while  brigandage  and  imperial 
conquest  are  profitable  forms  of  business. 
It  can  never  be  permanently  established  un- 
til the  lust  for  loot  and  conquest  is  con- 
fronted with  an  armed  resistance  that  makes 
it  too  hazardous  to  be  a  paying  enterprise. 
When  that  is  fully  realized,  like  piracy  on 
the  high  seas  and  other  forms  of  illicit  ac- 
quisitiveness, these  forms  of  depredation  will 
be  effectually  suppressed.  Nothing  but 
armed  force  under  civil  authority  can  make 
that  condition  real. 

It  is  illusory  to  believe  that  innocence  and 
185 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

self-effacement  afford  protection  to  a  weak 
nation.  The  whole  world  knows  that  we 
have  no  aggressive  designs  or  intentions. 
But  will  that  protect  us  from  insult  and  in- 
jury? The  use  of  high-sounding  menaces, 
alternated  with  professions  of  friendship 
that  are  believed  not  to  be  sincere,  is  a  dan- 
gerous pastime  for  a  nation  that  is  weak, 
divided,  and  impotent  for  action.  The  fact 
that  its  people  are  horrified,  offended,  and 
yet  so  devoted  to  peace  as  not  to  express 
frankly  their  convictions,  adds  nothing  to 
their  safety.  Europe  is  paying  very  little 
attention  to  us  now,  but  how  many  friends 
shall  we  have,  and  how  much  consideration 
shall  we  expect,  when,  pacified  and  har- 
monized, it  turns  its  attention  to  us? 

THE  TRADITIONAL  AMERICAN    ATTITUDE 

In  the  past  it  has  been  our  liberties  and 
our  free  institutions,  and  not  our  personal 
186 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

interests,  that  have  been  made  the  objects  of 
our  chief  sohcitude.  We  have  never  feared 
to  express  our  sympathies  with  downtrodden 
peoples.  It  is  surprising  that  it  has  required 
the  suggestion  that  we  might  have  to  face 
new  dangers,  in  order  to  awaken  our  inter- 
est in  the  international  situation.  Let  us 
not  forget  that  international  law — ^by 
which  we  have  always  understood  interna- 
tional justice — is  our  law,  to  which  we  can- 
not be  indifferent.  Whoever  violates  it,  in- 
directly injures  us,  as  well  as  all  mankind. 
An  attack  upon  it  is  an  attack  upon  civili- 
zation ;  and  it  would  mark  a  deplorable  state 
of  moral  degeneration,  if  we  had  not  the 
courage  to  take  our  stand  for  it,  with- 
out fear  of  consequences,  whatever  they 
might  be. 

It  is  not  invasion  that  we  have  to  fear 
the  most — God  forbid  that  we  should  ever 
become  so  supine  as  to  wait  for  that! — it 
187 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

is  our  right  of  innocent  passage  and  of  in- 
nocent commerce  on  a  free  ocean,  and  the 
invisible  bulwarks  of  liberty  and  self-govern- 
ment on  this  continent,  that  should  engage 
our  thought.  From  the  foundation  of  our 
government  we  have  always  in  the  past,  and 
sometimes  under  great  difficulties,  defended 
these  rights  and  these  bulwarks.  We  have 
not  waited  to  be  invaded,  we  have  aimed  at 
making  invasion  a  dangerous  enterprise.  In 
the  great  emergencies,  our  fathers,  usually 
without  due  preparation  for  meeting  them, 
have  fearlessly  responded  to  the  demands  of 
national  duty.  When,  in  our  weakness,  the 
so-called  "Holy  Alliance"  was  preparing 
to  reduce  to  colonial  dependence  the  Amer- 
ican republics  that  had  thrown  off  the  yoke 
of  Spain,  their  voice  was  lifted  up  in  pro- 
test, and  the  protest  was  heard  and  heeded. 
When  Louis  Napoleon  sent  an  Austrian 
Archduke  to  establish  an  empire  upon  our 
188 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

borders  in  Mexico,  the  voice  of  protest  was 
again  uttered,  and  the  undisbanded  army 
that  had  saved  the  Union  was  ready,  if  nec- 
essary, to  march  for  the  defense  of  our 
neighbor  against  imperial  subjugation. 


THE   FEAR   OF  MILITARISM 

All  the  arguments  that  have  been  ad- 
vanced against  "Militarism"  as  an  impend- 
ing danger  in  the  United  States  might  with 
equal  justice  be  urged  against  "Patriot- 
ism." There  is  no  voice  in  America  lifted 
for  a  military  regime.  All  our  instincts,  all 
our  habits,  all  our  interests,  and,  above  all, 
our  conception  of  the  nature  of  the  State, 
are  against  it.  We  are  not  a  military  people. 
We  have  no  military  projects.  We  are,  as 
a  people,  hostile  to  military  rule.  Our 
armies,  however  small,  have  never,  except  in 
great  crises,  risen  to  their  normal  propor- 
189 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

tion.  When  the  crises  have  passed,  officers 
and  men,  with  thankfulness  that  their  ser- 
vices were  no  longer  needed,  have  silently 
melted  into  our  busy  civil  population  as 
flakes  of  snow  drop  into  the  sea. 

Not  one  of  our  great  soldiers — Washing- 
ton, Grant,  Sherman,  or  anyone  in  the  long 
list  of  their  associates — ^has  ever  favored 
"Militarism."  It  is  not  in  the  character  and 
temper  of  our  people  to  permit  it,  either 
from  without  or  from  within.  But  it  is  in 
no  respect  a  drift  toward  "Militarism"  to 
say  that  every  able-bodied  young  man  in 
our  country  should  first  be  well  instructed 
in  the  meaning  and  value  of  our  free  insti- 
tutions, and  taught  a  wholesome  respect  for 
civil  authority,  and  then  be  impressed  with 
the  privilege  and  obligation  of  a  full  prepa- 
ration of  mind  and  body  to  defend  them.  A 
resolute  determination  to  do  this  would  not 
only  cause  any  Power  to  reflect  long  before 
190 


AMERICANISM  AND  WORLD  POLITICS 

it  would  disregard  the  rights  of  American 
citizens,  but  it  would  elevate  and  ennoble  the 
tone  of  the  present  and  the  coming  genera- 
tions of  American  youth.  Wholly  apart 
from  any  dangers,  on  land  or  sea,  we  need 
the  ethical  influence  of  an  enlightened  pa- 
triotism. 

Yes,  let  us  take  for  our  motto,  "America 
First":  not  with  the  meaning  of  a  dominat- 
ing primacy  over  others,  but  in  the  sense  of 
leadership  in  making  human  life  safer, 
human  endeavor  loftier,  human  suffering 
less  cruel,  human  toil  more  equitably  re- 
warded, and  human  fraternity  more  real, 
more  noble,  and  more  sincere.  We  have  a 
part  to  play  in  the  redemption  of  humanity 
and  the  better  organization  of  the  world. 
Let  us  play  it  without  being  too  proud  for 
the  performance  of  any  duty,  and  above  all 
let  us  play  it  without  fear. 


VI 

THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL 
DEFENSE 


14 


VI 

THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

If  we  are  to  discuss  with  profit  the  sub- 
ject of  national  defense,  it  is  necessary  to 
eliminate  from  the  discussion  all  topics  that 
have  no  decisive  relation  to  it.  This  is  very 
difficult  to  do,  for  the  reason  that  our  minds 
are  incumbered  by  many  considerations  that 
may  influence  action,  and  yet  have  no  real 
bearing  upon  a  decision  which  circumstances 
render  necessary  and  inevitable.  More  than 
anything  else,  we  require  a  preparation  of 
mind  that  will  enable  us  to  face,  to  consider, 
and  to  act  upon  the  question  of  national  de- 
fense with  a  clear  vision  of  immediate  duty. 

SOME   IRRELEVANT  PROPOSITIONS 

We  are  constantly  reminded  that  war  is 
a  horrible  scourge  which,  if  possible,  we 
195 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ought  by  all  honorable  means  to  avoid;  that 
the  killing  of  man  by  man  is  unworthy  of 
his  nobler  nature;  that,  if  armament  were 
totally  abandoned,  sanguinary  war  would 
become  impossible;  that  great  armies  and 
navies  impose  enormous  burdens  of  taxation 
upon  a  country  that  supports  them;  that 
money  expended  upon  them  might  profit- 
ably be  used  in  education,  in  scientific  re- 
search, and  in  alleviating  suffering;  that  pre- 
ponderant force  does  not  necessarily  insure 
perfect  justice;  that  the  proper  mode  of  set- 
tling international  disputes  is  arbitration; 
that  the  nations  should  organize  an  obliga- 
tory international  tribunal  and  submit  their 
differences  to  it;  that  an  international 
police  force  would  serve  all  the  purposes 
of  public  peace  and  order ;  and,  finally,  that, 
by  adopting  principles  of  justice  and  fra- 
ternity, war  would  be  rendered  entirely  un- 
necessary. 

196 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

THE    REAL    QUESTION    STATED 

Few  of  US  would  be  disposed  to  dispute 
any  one  of  these  general  propositions,  and 
it  may  be  that  every  one  of  them  is  capable 
of  a  conclusive  demonstration.  The  impor- 
tant point,  however,  is  that  they  have  no 
bearing  upon  the  concrete  question:  Should 
this  nation,  at  this  time,  be  prepared  to  de- 
fend its  territory  from  invasion,  its  people 
from  robbery  and  murder,  its  neutral  rights 
of  commerce  on  the  high  seas,  and  its  priv- 
ilege of  speaking  its  mind  freely  and  with- 
out fear  concerning  the  rights  of  human- 
ity? 

It  is  to  be  desired,  therefore,  that,  in  dis- 
cussing a  great  question  of  national  policy, 
there  may  be  no  attempt  to  confuse  thought 
or  deflect  it  from  its  proper  object  by  an 
appeal  to  our  sensibilities,  or  by  an  intima- 
tion that  those  who  favor  efficient  national 
197 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

defense  are  less  mindful  than  others  of  the 
highest  aims  and  aspirations  of  our  human 
nature.  We  may  all  join  most  heartily,  as 
some  of  us  have  labored  long  and  assidu- 
ously, in  pleading  for  universal  justice  and, 
if  it  is  possible,  universal  peace.  For  my 
own  part,  I  do  not  doubt  that  there  is  a 
highway  that  leads  to  peace,  but  I  believe 
it  passes  through  the  narrow  gateway  of  in- 
ternational justice.  Until  these  aspirations 
for  peace  and  justice,  in  which  we  all  share, 
are  fully  realized,  we  shall  continue  to  be 
confronted  by  problems  of  national  duty 
which  cannot  be  honorably  disregarded. 

OUR  PRIMARY  NATIONAL  OBLIGATION 

It  results  from  the  American  conception 

of  the  State,  that  the  primary  obligation  of 

the  American  Government  is  the  protection 

of  the  lives  and  the  property  of  American 

198 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

citizens,  wherever  they  may  be  in  the  in- 
nocent pursuit  of  their  legitimate  busi- 
ness. 

The  duty  of  the  State  to  protect  the  rights 
of  its  citizens  is  the  comer-stone  of  Amer- 
ican Democracy.  It  is  for  that  that  the 
State  exists,  and  it  is  from  the  intention  to 
render  it  possible  that  the  State  derives  the 
justification  of  its  existence.  Our  whole  po- 
litical edifice  rests  upon  that  foundation, 
and  we  cannot  consistently  permit  it  to  be 
questioned.  It  is  asserted  with  emphasis  in 
the  Preamble  to  the  Federal  Constitution 
as  a  principal  object  of  our  more  perfect 
Union;  which  is,  in  its  very  nature,  a  pro- 
vision "for  the  common  defense,"  not  pri- 
marily of  the  separate  States,  but  of  the  peo- 
ple of  the  United  States,  in  whose  name 
the  Federal  Government  is  created.  It  is 
for  that  purpose  that  "taxes,  duties,  imports, 
and  excises"  are  laid  and  collected  from  the 
199 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

people;  and  it  is  in  addition  to  this  duty  of 
protecting  the  individual  citizen  that,  in  a 
separate  article  of  the  Constitution,  the 
United  States  guarantees  "to  every  State  in 
this  Union  a  Republican  form  of  govern- 
ment," and  that  it  will  "protect  each  of  them 
against  invasion." 

If  our  Government  has  become  negligent 
of  this  primary  obligation,  and  if  absorp- 
tion in  their  own  private  affairs  has  ren- 
dered any  of  our  fellow-citizens  oblivious  of 
it  or  indifferent  regarding  it,  there  is  occa- 
sion for  alarm  at  the  national  degeneration 
which  such  dereliction  and  apathy  would 
imply. 

It  may,  indeed,  involve  some  trouble  and 
expense  to  safeguard  American  life  and 
property  in  semi-barbarous  countries  and 
upon  the  high  seas  which  are  the  common 
highway  of  the  nations;  but  this  incon- 
venience cannot  exempt  our  Government 
200 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

from  its  obligation  to  protect  the  rights  of 
its  citizens. 


THE  FRUITS  OF  THE  NEW  POLITICS 

It  would  be  intolerable  that  it  should  ever 
be  advanced,  as  an  excuse  for  such  delin- 
quency, that,  being  weak,  or  poor,  or  help- 
less, or  already  dead,  any  of  our  fellow-citi- 
zens should  be  made  a  vicarious  sacrifice  to 
preserve  our  peace  as  a  nation;  and  that,  in 
the  interest  of  the  nation  as  a  whole,  the 
wrongs  inflicted  upon  them  should  be  con- 
cealed, or  glossed  over,  or  forgotten. 

Such  a  course  would  betray  a  depth  of 
moral  degradation  in  our  public  and  private 
life  that  should  fill  the  mind  of  every  Amer- 
ican with  shame  for  his  country. 

And  yet,  would  not  such  neglect  to  exer- 
cise protection  be  a  strictly  logical  position 
to  be  supported  by  everyone  who  rejects  the 
201 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

fundamental  American  doctrine  that  the  in- 
dividual citizen  possesses  inherent  and  in- 
alienable rights  which  government  may  not 
ignore,  and  which  majorities  may  not  over- 
ride? If  human  rights  are  merely  the  gifts 
of  government,  and  exist  only  where  there 
is  express  legislation  conferring  them,  what 
right  has  the  citizen  to  complain,  if  his  gov- 
ernment refuses  to  protect  him  when  it 
finds  it  inconvenient  to  do  so?  And,  if  nat- 
ural rights  do  not  exist,  if  rights  are  what 
the  majority  pleases  to  make  them,  without 
restriction,  why  may  not  a  few  unfortunate 
citizens  be  consistently  sacrificed  for  the 
peace  of  the  country  ?  Why  should  the  con- 
tented and  prosperous  people  of  the  United 
States — a  hundred  millions  of  them — be 
menaced  with  the  risks  and  costs  of  war  in 
defending  the  alleged  rights  of  a  paltry  hun- 
dred American  men,  women,  and  little  chil- 
dren, shot  through  and  blown  to  fragments, 
202 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

or  drowned  without  even  an  attempt  at  res- 
cue, when  innocently  sailing  upon  the  high 
seas  on  a  non-combatant  vessel?  And  why 
should  a  great  government  like  ours  trouble 
itself  about  other  hundreds  of  American 
citizens,  driven  from  their  homes  and 
slaughtered  on  their  way  to  safety,  some  of 
them  even  upon  the  soil  of  their  own 
country,  at  the  hands  of  Mexican  cut- 
throats ? 

Undoubtedly,  the  new  political  philoso- 
phy, phases  of  which  have  been  discussed 
in  the  previous  chapters  of  this  book,  fully 
justifies  the  conclusion  that,  since  majori- 
ties possess  unlimited  rights,  and  minorities 
none  except  those  generously  accorded  to 
them  by  the  will  of  the  majority,  the  only 
recourse  for  an  American  citizen  is  quietly 
to  abandon  in  advance  any  right  he  may 
hitherto  have  supposed  himself  to  possess, 
and  accept  with  submission  and  thankful- 
203 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ness  any  lot  which  superior  force  may  gra- 
ciously apportion  out  to  him. 


THE  DOMINANCE  OF  ECONOMIC  THINKING 

If  this  were  really  the  disposition  of  our 
people,  it  would  be  superfluous  to  continue 
a  discussion  regarding  national  defense.  If 
the  spirit  of  the  American  people  is  so  broken 
by  sybarite  living  and  socialistic  dreams  that 
they  are  no  longer  regardful  of  one  another's 
inherent  rights,  and  do  not  even  admit  their 
existence;  if  a  sham  altruism  has  been  cul- 
tivated to  a  point  where  the  individual  really 
counts  for  nothing,  it  would  seem  that  there 
would  be  no  valid  objection  to  letting  an 
enemy  take  possession  of  us;  for,  perhaps, 
his  presence  would  beat  into  our  dulled 
moral  consciousness  some  faint  reminiscence 
of  American  manhood. 

But  this  supposition  cannot  be  accepted. 
204 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

The  truth  is,  we  are  awakening  from  a  cata- 
leptic state.  We  have  concentrated  our  at- 
tention upon  our  material  condition  until 
we  have  been  hypnotized  by  it.  We  have 
come  to  consider  all  things  from  a  purely 
economic  point  of  view.  We  cannot  afford 
military  preparation,  because  it  is  too  ex- 
pensive. The  most  effective  arguments  em- 
ployed against  it  are  economic.  It  would, 
it  is  complained,  increase  taxation,  create 
useless  industries,  deflect  labor  and  capital 
from  greater  utilities,  continue  indefinitely 
to  demand  increased  appropriations  for  a 
greater  army  and  navy ;  and,  what  is  most 
important,  the  money  spent  on  such  prepara- 
tion could  be  more  wisely  expended  upon 
good  roads,  scientific  experimentation,  edu- 
cation, or  some  form  of  public  philanthropy. 
Have  we  then  unconsciously  degenerated 
into  mere  instruments  of  economic  calcula- 
tion, and  become  a  race  of  animated  cash 
205 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

registers?  How  otherwise  is  it  possible  to 
confront  a  primary  obligation  with  the  ques- 
tion: What  will  it  cost?  We  might,  it  is 
conceded,  protect  American  life  and  prop- 
erty, if  it  could  be  done  with  less  expense, 
or  on  some  cut-rate  plan,  where  there  would 
be  a  financial  return ;  or  if,  for  example,  we 
could  be  assured  that  Mexico  would  not  be 
more  formidable  than  Haiti.  But  if  prepa- 
ration for  national  defense  is  to  require  any 
proportionally  great  sum,  and  especially  if 
it  is  likely  ever  to  draw  us  into  a  defensive 
war,  would  it  not  be  better,  suggests  the  ob- 
jector, to  maintain  an  attitude  of  peace  re- 
gardless of  all  indignities;  or  at  least  to 
postpone  active  preparation  for  defense  un- 
til we  are  actually  attacked  ?  And  thus,  vol- 
untarily closing  our  eyes  to  the  actual  dan- 
gers in  which  we  are  placed  and  the  duty  to 
face  them,  the  nation  pauses  to  debate  its 
course,  like  a  boy  going  to  a  country  fair 
206 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

with  a  shilling  in  his  pocket  and  wondering 
how  he  can  get  the  most  gratification  for 
his  money. 


THE    INFLUENCE   OF    PACIFISM 

For  this  state  of  mind  the  pacifist  propa- 
ganda in  this  country  is  in  some  degree  re- 
sponsible. It  has  tended  to  conceal  the  sor- 
did motives  of  the  opponents  of  defensive 
preparation  under  a  garb  of  moral  senti- 
ment. Great  organizations,  richly  endowed 
and  conducted  by  able  men,  have  filled  the 
land  with  literature  condemning  war  in  all 
its  aspects;  proclaiming  not  only  its  exces- 
sive cost,  but  its  cruelty,  its  inutility,  and 
its  criminal  character.  Exhortations  to  dis- 
arm or  to  limit  armament  have  been  sent 
broadcast  throughout  the  country  and 
throughout  the  world.  Although  little  ef- 
fect has  been  produced  anywhere,  except  in 
207 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

the  United  States,  here  a  general  conviction 
has  heen  produced  among  our  people  that 
war  is  under  all  circumstances  to  be  avoided. 
Eloquent  speakers  and  popular  writers  had 
assured  us,  before  the  present  European  con- 
flict, that  war  had  become  virtually  impos- 
sible; and  the  conclusion  was  drawn  that 
preparation  even  for  national  defense  was 
not  only  useless  but  would  fatally  compro- 
mise ourselves  as  a  peace-loving  nation,  and 
the  cause  of  universal  peace. 

So  long  as  this  movement  remained  a 
purely  philanthropic  enterprise,  appealing 
to  the  good  will  of  men  everywhere,  in  the 
endeavor  to  persuade  all  nations  to  employ 
judicial  rather  than  military  methods  in 
reconciling  their  differences,  it  deserved, 
and,  in  fact,  received,  almost  unanimous  ap- 
proval in  the  United  States.  Only  one  criti- 
cism was  passed  upon  it.  It  was  pointed 
out  that  the  emphasis  should  not  be  placed 
208 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

upon  peace  but  upon  justice.  These  great 
endowments,  it  was  suggested,  were  wast- 
ing their  energies  in  advocating  futile  pro- 
jects of  disarmament,  of  whose  success  there 
was  no  prospect ;  and  it  was  urged  that  they 
should  consecrate  themselves  to  universal 
justice  rather  than  to  universal  peace,  on 
the  ground  that  peace  without  justice  is  im- 
possible. Even  if  it  were  possible,  it  would 
mark  the  end  of  ethical  purpose  in  the  world. 

THE  EFFECTS  OF   POLITICAL  PACIFISM 

When  at  length  antagonism  to  prepara- 
tion for  the  military  defense  of  the  country 
took  on  the  form  of  influencing  legislation 
adversely  to  it,  what  had  been  in  the  main 
a  commendable  movement  became  a  source 
of  public  peril.  It  was  at  this  point  that 
political  pacifism  had  its  birth.  Philan- 
thropic pacifism  had  become  the  best  organ- 
15  209 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ized,  the  best  financed,  and  the  most  strenu- 
ous political  influence  in  the  country.  A 
speech  in  favor  of  battleships  was  likely  to 
occasion  the  loss  of  a  seat  in  Congress.  The 
favor  of  the  great  peace  organizations  had 
become  a  factor  affecting  political  success. 

The  officers  of  our  Government  were  not 
slow  in  recognizing  the  force  of  the  new  in- 
fluence. Arbitration  treaties,  with  no  re- 
serve of  honor  or  vital  interests,  became  pop- 
ular. Even  these  did  not  satisfy  the  ultra- 
pacifist  evangelists.  War  must  be  made  im- 
possible. Delay  of  action  must  be  imposed 
to  an  extent  that  deprived  it  of  all  value. 

Serious  and  experienced  men,  familiar 
with  world  conditions,  were  astonished  at 
these  adventures,  and  mild  remonstrances 
were  offered;  but  in  vain.  The  country 
was  behind  these  commitments,  and  the 
Nobel  Prize  invited  preeminence  in  the  pious 
task  of  promoting  peace. 
210 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

Having  once  entered  practical  politics,  the 
peace  movement  was  soon  made  openly  of- 
ficial. Treaties  multiplied,  and  in  the  pre- 
liminaries to  every  one  of  them  it  was  an- 
nounced that  the  United  States  was  deter- 
mined to  avoid  war.  Great  and  small,  the 
nations  were  bidden  by  our  Government  to 
the  banquet-board  of  peace.  One  high  of- 
ficial is  reported  to  have  declared  that  while 
he  remained  in  office  there  would  be  no  war. 


THE  LOSS  OF  NATIONAL  PRESTIGE 

There  was,  of  course,  nothing  evil  in  these 
pacific  intentions;  but  there  was  a  lament- 
able ignorance  of  the  effect  they  were  cer- 
tain to  produce.  We  have  already  had  suf- 
ficient proofs  of  it. 

It  required  only  consistency  in  conform- 
ing to  this  "high  ideal"  of  international  con- 
duct, to  establish  the  conviction  in  foreign 
211 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

countries  that  the  Government  of  the  United 
States  not  only  did  not  want  war,  but  was 
afraid  of  war,  and  was  determined  to  avoid 
war,  no  matter  what  the  circumstances  might 
be.  In  June,  1914,  the  present  writer  was 
told  by  one  of  the  most  experienced  diplo- 
matists in  Europe,  himself  a  tried  and  true 
friend  of  peace,  and  a  life-long  advocate  of 
every  good  cause:  "Your  country  has  com- 
pletely lost  its  former  international  prestige 
by  its  conduct  in  regard  to  Mexico.  I  do 
not  see  how  it  can  ever  recover  it,  unless  it 
is  prepared  for  action ;  and  disposed,  if  nec- 
essary, to  act  with  vigor.  Your  querulous 
tone,  unsupported  by  firm  resolution,  de- 
prives the  United  States  of  all  its  former 
influence.  You  are  drifting  into  the  atti- 
tude of  a  scolding  old  woman!" 

If  it  were  not  just,  it  would  be  a  duty 
to  resent  this  rebuke ;  but  can  we  dispute  the 
justice  of  it  ?    We  have  simply  been  taken  at 
212 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

our  word  that,  no  matter  what  happens, 
there  is  to  be  no  war.  Had  our  attitude  been : 
We  seek  the  conditions  of  peace ;  but  this  na- 
tion cannot  and  will  not  remain  friendly 
toward  any  nation  that  does  not  treat  its 
citizens  justly;  and  we  shall  everywhere, 
with  all  our  resources,  protect  their  lives 
and  property — the  situation  might  have  been 
different.  No  one  would  then  have  decided 
to  treat  us  with  indignity  without  first  think- 
ing it  over  very  seriously.  As  it  is,  in- 
dignities have  been  deliberately  planned  and 
deliberately  executed  with  the  belief  that, 
while  we  might  discuss  them,  we  would  not 
openly  declare  that  friendship  with  those  who 
could  purposely  inflict  such  wrongs  upon  our 
fellow-citizens  was  no  longer  possible.  And 
thus  our  excessive  zeal  for  peace  and  our 
inadequate  sense  of  obligation  to  our  own 
citizens  have  brought  us  first  into  humilia- 
tion, and  finally  into  a  confession  of  our 
213 


t  AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

helplessness;  for  we  have  felt  resentment 
which  we  could  not  satisfy,  and  we  have  wit- 
nessed the  spectacle  of  the  President  of  the 
United  States  leaving  the  capital  and  mak- 
ing a  tour  of  the  country,  in  order  tardily 
to  inform  the  people  that  he  could  not  pre- 
serve both  peace  and  honor  unless  they 
gave  him  a  new  mandate  and  additional 
means  of  action  through  their  representa- 
tives in  Congress.  If  the  means  are  not 
furnished,  the  inference  will  undoubtedly 
be  that  peace  is  upon  all  occasions  to  take 
precedence  over  honor. 

AN   UNRECOGNIZED  SOURCE  OF  DANGER 

Hitherto  we  have  paid  but  little  attention 
in  this  country  to  the  plans,  and  purposes, 
and  spirit  of  other  nations.  We  have 
proudly  imagined  ourselves  a  "World- 
Power,"  without  considering  whether  or  not 
214 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

we  have  become  a  world-potency.  We  have 
all  the  fresh  confidence  of  youth,  but  have 
not  yet  acquired  the  wisdom  that  usually 
comes  with  age. 

One  lesson  that  we  have  yet  to  learn  is 
that  no  nation  can  pursue  an  arbitrary  pol- 
icy of  its  own  without  regard  to  the  policies 
of  other  nations,  unless  it  is  stronger  than 
any  probable  coalition  that  may  sometime 
be  arrayed  against  it.  There  are,  in  diplo- 
matic crises,  but  three  alternatives:  to  be 
able  to  stand  alone  with  undisputed  prim- 
acy; to  join  with  others  in  that  which  others 
will  agree  may  be  done ;  or  to  stand  aside  in 
impotence,  if  not  in  humiliation,  and  allow 
others  to  work  their  will. 

There  are  always  more  reasons  for  peace 
than  there  are  for  war;  but,  when  the  pas- 
sions of  a  nation  take  the  place  of  farseeing 
statecraft,  or  the  weakness  of  a  nation  in- 
vites aggression,  a  very  bad  reason  may  ulti- 
215 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

mately  prove  more  decisive  for  war  than  all 
the  good  reasons  for  peace.  There  are  con- 
ditions which  a  proud  people,  even  though 
devoted  to  peace,  will  not  endure;  and  the 
greatest  of  all  dangers  is  that  a  people  un- 
prepared to  assert  its  will  may  suddenly  de- 
mand what  it  cannot  execute. 

So  long  as  a  nation  is  considered  a  force 
to  be  reckoned  with,  its  voice  of  warning 
will  be  listened  to;  but  when  it  is  believed 
that  it  has  no  policies  which  it  will  resolutely 
defend,  it  ceases  to  be  of  international  im- 
portance. If  its  opinion  of  itself  and  the 
opinion  of  others  regarding  it  are  widely 
different,  it  traverses  a  moment  of  supreme 
danger;  for  in  the  eyes  of  others  it  has  be- 
come offensive  without  possessing  the  ability 
to  defend  itself.  Its  wealth,  however  great, 
unless  it  is  capable  of  prompt  transforma- 
tion into  military  efficiency,  affords  it  no 
protection  from  aggression ;  for  the  sole  pur- 
216 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

pose  of  assault  may  be  the  extortion  of  a 
future  advantage  to  be  enforced  in  the  terms 
of  peace. 


OUR  FIRST  LINE  OF  DEFENSE 

Our  jSrst  line  of  national  defense  is  not, 
as  we  are  sometimes  told,  our  navy;  it  is 
our  diplomacy.  Diplomacy  is  to  a  nation 
what  the  senses  are  to  the  human  body. 
It  is  its  function  to  warn  the  govern- 
ment of  the  impending  dangers,  and  to 
enable  it  to  perceive  how  to  meet  them. 
If  our  diplomacy  be  casual,  fluctuating, 
negligent,  or  without  instruction,  it  will 
afford  us  no  protection.  On  the  contrary, 
it  may  betray  us  in  the  midst  of  unseen 
perils. 

For  the  greater  part  of  our  existence  as 
a  nation,  we  have  dwelt  in  comparative  re- 
moteness from  European  conflicts;  but  the 
21T 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

development  of  oceanic  transportation  has 
abolished  our  geographic  isolation.  The 
mastery  of  the  sea  has  made  all  nations 
neighbors.  We  possess  no  natural  defenses. 
We  have  a  widely  extended  territory,  with 
many  thousands  of  miles  of  accessible  coast- 
line on  two  oceans.  We  must  not  forget 
that  we  have  assumed  the  responsibilities  of 
a  World-Power,  with  insular  dependencies, 
an  isthmian  canal,  sea-borne  commerce  on 
every  sea,  fellow-citizens  engaged  in  legiti- 
mate business  and,  sometimes,  of  national 
importance,  in  every  civilized  and  many 
semi-barbarous  countries.  Are  we,  by  some 
incantation  of  pure  idealism,  to  dispense  our- 
selves as  a  nation  from  the  obligation  to  act 
with  full  knowledge  of  what  is  going  on 
in  the  world,  and  how  our  interests  are  to 
be  affected  by  it  ?  But,  unless  we  are  served 
by  intelligent  and  vigilant  diplomacy,  we 
shall  continue,  however  great  our  national 
218 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

resources  may  be,  to  remain  unprepared  to 
meet  future  emergencies. 


OUR  SPECIAL  AMERICAN   INTERESTS 

There  has  been  developed  on  this  conti- 
nent a  system  of  self-government  based  on 
the  inherent  and  inalienable  rights  of  the  in- 
dividual man.  It  is  an  inheritance  which 
has  cost  much  heroism  to  establish  and  main- 
tain. When  Europe  is  reaching  out  for 
world  dominion,  with  thoroughly  equipped 
armies  composed  of  millions  of  men;  when 
Asia  is  marked  for  future  subdivision,  and 
already  subject  to  foreign  spheres  of  in- 
fluence ;  when  the  map  of  Africa  has  become 
a  maze  of  European  colonies;  when  every 
island  of  every  sea  is  a  pawn  in  the  game  of 
empire;  when  many  of  the  American  re- 
publics are  regarded  as  legitimate  fields  of 
imperial  exploitation,  and  are  themselves 
219 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

comparatively  defenseless,  may  we  reason- 
ably expect  that  we  can  preserve  our  boasted 
Democracy,  if  we  have  no  means  of  offer- 
ing it  protection? 

It  is  highly  probable  that  if  Europe  were 
at  peace  today  we  should  have  a  European 
question  in  Mexico  tomorrow.  It  must  not 
be  overlooked  that  we  are  not  the  only  ones 
who  have  suffered  from  the  continued  state 
of  revolution  in  that  country.  Our  Govern- 
ment has  seen  reasons  satisfactory  to  itself 
in  the  midst  of  extraordinary  provocations 
to  pursue  a  policy  of  passive  delay  rather 
than  one  of  energetic  action.  I  shall  not 
here  discuss  that  policy;  but  the  end  is  not 
yet.  Whether  revolution  be  suppressed  or 
not,  when  Europe  is  ready  to  act  in  Mexico, 
that  country  will  have  to  face  the  demand 
for  the  payment  of  obligations  created  by 
the  Huerta  Government,  which  here  has 
been  declared  to  be  no  government,  but 
220 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

which  in  Europe  has  been  not  only  aided 
and  trusted,  but  regularly  recognized. 


THE  NEED  OF  A  CLEAR  FOREIGN  POLICY 

If  we  are  to  avoid  future  complications, 
it  will  be  necessary  to  frame  and  to  unite 
upon  a  foreign  policy  that  we  can  maintain. 
What  should  such  a  policy  be? 

It  will  necessarily  have  a  negative  and  a 
positive  character.  On  the  negative  side,  we 
do  not  desire  to  annex  any  foreign  territory ; 
we  do  not  entertain  any  schemes  of  con- 
quest; we  do  not  wish  to  meddle  with  the 
internal  affairs  of  our  neighbors ;  we  do  not 
aim  at  acquiring  exclusive  concessions  in 
foreign  countries;  we  do  not  intend  to  im- 
pose our  authority  anywhere  where  a  re- 
sponsible government  exists. 

On  the  positive  side,  we  desire  to  have 
peace  with  all  nations  based  on  justice,  hon- 
221 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

or,  and  respect,  for  treaties;  we  object  to 
the  armed  intervention  of  Europe  in  the 
affairs  of  this  continent;  we  expect  that 
claims  upon  the  American  republics  will 
be  judicially  adjudicated  before  they  are 
enforced;  we  demand,  and  will  require,  the 
recognition  of  our  right  of  innocent  com- 
merce on  the  high  seas ;  we  shall  insist  upon 
respect  for  American  lives  and  property 
everywhere ;  we  shall  recognize  any  de  facto 
government  that  protects  these  rights  within 
its  actual  jurisdiction,  and  shall  confide  in 
no  government  that  is  incapable  of  such  pro- 
tection; we  are  prepared  to  negotiate  con- 
ventions for  the  firmer  establishment  of  in- 
ternational justice,  but  we  shall  enter  into 
no  formal  alliances  or  any  agreement  bind- 
ing us  to  make  war  upon  any  nation,  or  in 
the  interest  of  any  nation,  but  shall  hold  our- 
selves free  by  concurrent  action  with  others 
to  pursue  a  common  end  of  preserving  peace 
222 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

and  procuring  conformity  to  international 
law. 

Are  we  capable  of  maintaining  such  a  pol- 
icy? If  we  are  to  do  so,  we  must  be  strong 
enough  to  make  it  advantageous  to  any  na- 
tion raising  a  controversy  with  us  to  respect 
our  position. 

THE  PRESENT  INTERNATIONAL  PROBLEM 

It  has  been  pressed  home  upon  us  that 
the  great  present  problem  of  civilization  is, 
and  will  be  until  it  is  solved,  the  suppression 
of  violence  by  barbarous  bands  and  imperial 
designs,  and  the  establishment  of  equal  rights 
among  the  nations,  great  and  small,  under 
a  reign  of  law.  The  most  important  ques- 
tion civilization  has  to  answer  is :  How  can 
that  problem  be  solved?  And  we  shall  have 
to  perform  our  part  in  answering  it. 

When  the  American  people  have  had  time 
223 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

to  realize  the  character  and  extent  of  the 
emergency  our  age  is  called  upon  to  meet — 
and  the  moment  for  action  admits  of  no  de- 
lay— their  decision  cannot  be  doubtful.  The 
caU  to  duty  may  require  sacrifices,  but  we 
shall  be  a  nobler  people  for  making  them. 

The  American  people  will  never  tolerate 
the  formation  of  an  irresponsible  fighting 
machine,  whose  chief  object  is  efficiency  in 
the  art  of  killing  men,  and  whose  chief  pas- 
sion is  a  desire  for  its  own  glory.  What 
they  will  demand  will  be  a  body  of  trained 
citizen-defenders  of  their  country,  thor- 
oughly permeated  with  its  spirit  and  ideals, 
and  devoted  to  carrying  out  its  pacific  pol- 
icies. 

THE  ATTITUDE  OF  OUR  YOUNG  MEN 

This  signifies  that,  in  addition  to  a  na- 
tional policy  and  an  organized  force,  prepa- 
ration must  be  made  for  the  education  of  the 
224 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

citizen-soldier  in  the  meaning  and  duties  of 
citizenship.  Such  education  must  be  of  the 
mind,  the  body,  the  will  and  the  character. 
It  should  include  the  manual  of  arms  and 
the  discipline  of  the  camp. 

A  million  young  men  during  the  present 
year  will,  for  the  first  time,  have  a  voice 
in  determining  the  destinies  of  the  United 
States.  What  will  their  attitude  be?  Will 
they  not,  in  the  conscious  strength  of  their 
manhood  and  with  a  sense  of  their  new  re- 
sponsibility, say  to  one  another:  Let  us 
make  of  the  constitutional  system  of  fed- 
erated States  embodied  in  the  American  Re- 
public a  bulwark,  an  example,  and  a  ground 
of  hope  for  the  future  of  the  world?  Will 
they  not  say  to  the  rest  of  mankind:  We 
in  America  have  stood  for  the  dominion  of 
law,  for  a  world  tribunal,  for  the  sanctity 
of  treaties,  for  the  rights  of  neutrals,  and 
for  the  inviolability  of  innocent  persons. 
16  225 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

We  have  discouraged  armament  and  sought 
to  accomplish  its  limitation  both  by  precept 
and  example.  Now  we  say  to  you,  if  you 
are  going  on  with  it,  if  you  are  intending 
to  overpower  helpless  peoples  and  to  domi- 
nate the  world  by  brute  force,  you  at  least 
shall  not  dominate  over  us.  If  armament 
is  to  be  continued,  if  human  rights  are  to 
be  disregarded,  and  force  is  to  rule  the  world, 
we  are  ready  to  stand  where  our  fathers 
stood,  and  we  shall  see  to  it  that  there  is 
one  country  where  reason  and  conscience, 
liberty  and  law,  shall  be  secure. 

THE   NECESSITY  OF   NATIONAL   IDEALS 

It  is  its  ideals  that  make  a  nation  truly 
great.  It  will  be  the  ideals  entertained  by 
our  people,  and  especially  by  our  young 
men,  in  the  present  world  crisis  that  will 
determine  the  destinies  of  the  United  States. 
226 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

What  then  are  the  ideals  that  really  ap- 
peal to  us? 

We  have  shown  in  recent  times  a  deep  in- 
terest in  social  progress.  We  have  been  im- 
patient of  the  impediments,  real  or  apparent, 
to  greater  equity  in  American  life.  It  can- 
not be  doubted  that  there  is  among  the 
younger  generation  in  our  country,  and  in 
every  part  of  it,  a  vigorous  growth  of  ethical 
feeling — a  more  ardent  love  of  justice  and 
fair  play.  We  have  been  disposed  some- 
times, in  our  reaction  from  existing  evils,  to 
find  fault  with  our  political  institutions,  and 
have  wished  if  necessary  to  substitute  others 
for  them.  But,  when  we  come  to  think  it 
over,  is  it  our  institutions,  or  is  it  our  ma- 
terial conceptions  of  life,  that  are  at  fault? 
Let  us  frankly  ask  ourselves  if  we  should 
all  be  entirely  content,  on  condition  that  all 
our  fellow-citizens  were  well  housed,  well 
clothed,  well  fed,  and  agreeably  amused,  if, 
227 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

at  the  same  time,  we  were  obliged  to  con- 
fess that,  as  a  nation,  we  were  weak,  sordid, 
and  afraid? 


THE  NATION'S  DUTY  TO  THE  FUTURE 

Do  we  not  realize  that  we  need,  as  a  peo- 
ple, a  more  powerful  tonic  than  can  be  found 
in  any  of  the  paltry  nostrums  dispensed  by 
the  critics  of  our  forms  of  government? 
They  have  appealed  to  our  envy  of  the  rich 
and  our  love  of  power;  they  have  flattered 
us  as  "sovereigns,"  and  implored  us  to  make 
them  our  ministers  of  state;  but  when  have 
they  sounded  the  trumpet  call  of  personal 
duty  to  the  nation,  or  themselves  set  the 
example  of  personal  sacrifice  ? 

For  years  we  have  been  preaching  to  one 
another  the  gospel  of  voting-in  the  mil- 
lennium, and  of  financing  it  by  new  methods 
of  taxation ;  but  we  have  forgotten  that  the 
228 


THE  DUTY  OF  NATIONAL  DEFENSE 

Kingdom  of  God  is  within  ourselves,  and 
that  its  fullness  of  time  must  come  by  our 
own  inner  growth,  and  not  by  outward  ob- 
servation. What  has  there  been  since  the 
Spanish- American  War  to  make  any  young 
man  feel  that  he  is  really  a  part  of  the  coun- 
try? What  has  he  been  taught  of  its  mean- 
ing and  of  his  place  in  it?  But  why  not 
make  him  feel,  at  the  time  when  the  whole 
significance  of  life  is  dawning  upon  him, 
in  that  moment  of  adolescence  when  he 
craves  an  unlifting  influence,  that  he  is  in 
truth  a  vital  part  of  the  nation?  And  why 
not  leave  to  him,  throughout  his  lifetime, 
the  sweet  memory  that  he  has  really  served 
his  country  by  fitting  himself  to  be  its  de- 
fender? Why  should  he  not  have,  as  long 
as  he  lives,  the  lingering  glow  of  that  in- 
spiration felt  by  every  old  soldier  who  real- 
ly helped  to  save  the  Union,  when  he  sees 
the  flag  go  by?  Then  he  would  know  what 
229 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

it  is  to  be  an  American.  Then  he  would  be 
able  to  pass  on  to  his  sons  and  to  his  grand- 
sons the  meaning  of  Americanism. 

There  is  in  every  one  of  us  something 
more  than  the  wish  to  be  well  fed  and 
clothed,  and  to  have  an  easy  place  in  life. 
We  feel,  and  we  know,  that  there  is  some- 
thing greater  and  infinitely  more  important 
than  our  appetites  and  desires.  To  feel  that 
we  are  a  part  of  the  larger  life,  that  it  has 
a  right  to  command  us,  and  that  we  are 
never  our  true  selves  unless  we  obey  it — ^that 
is  what  makes  us  really  men. 


VII 
NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 


VII 

NEW   PERILS    FOR   AMERICANISM 

If  statesmanship  consists  in  foresight  and 
preparation  to  meet  new  conditions,  there 
is  at  this  moment  greater  need  of  it  than  at 
any  time  since  our  Civil  War. 

It  would  be  almost  voluntary  blindness 
not  to  perceive  that  this  country  is  exposed 
to  a  double  peril;  for,  while  our  wealth  and 
resources  are  at  present  insufficiently  pro- 
tected by  our  inadequate  national  defenses, 
rendering  us  liable  to  possible  dangers  from 
without,  we  may  be  called  upon  to  face  even 
more  serious  and  more  immediate  misfor- 
tunes from  within. 

THE  INTERNATIONAL  SITUATION 

At  this  moment,  when  all  the  Great  Pow- 
ers of  Europe  are  engaged  in  a  struggle  the 
233 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

most  gigantic  in  its  magnitude  and  the  most 
bitter  in  its  intensity  that  the  world  has 
ever  known,  when  the  laws  of  international 
intercourse,  upon  which  we  had  become  ac- 
customed to  rely  for  our  protection,  are  more 
unsettled  than  for  centuries  they  have  ever 
been,  it  may  be  that  American  Democracy 
will  suddenly  be  subjected  to  a  test  of  its 
virility. 

It  is  not,  however,  to  any  sudden  military 
attack  upon  us  that  I  look  forward  with 
most  apprehension.  It  may  well  be  that 
while  foreign  nations  are  preoccupied  with 
so  great  a  contest,  and  even  long  afterward, 
we  shall  remain  immune  from  violence;  but 
this  does  not,  in  the  least  degree,  diminish 
our  responsibility  at  this  time  for  the  pro- 
tection of  American  life  and  property,  or 
justify  the  postponement  of  adequate  prepa- 
ration for  making  our  words  and  our  rights 
respected  in  the  world. 
234 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

We  need  especially  to  be  impressed  with 
the  fact  that  it  is  not  of  a  mere  passing 
crisis  in  international  affairs  that  we  are 
now  called  upon  to  think;  but  of  a  long 
vista  of  possible  future  conditions,  and  above 
all  of  the  formation  and  maintenance  of  the 
permanent  policy  by  which  our  conduct  as 
a  nation  is  to  be  guided  in  the  future. 

THE   WORLD   CONFLICT   FOR   TRADE 

If  we  subject  the  existing  international 
situation  to  a  close  analysis  and  endeavor  to 
discover  what  are  the  essential  elements  that 
enter  into  it  and  the  hidden  causes  that 
have  produced  it,  we  find  that,  at  the  bot- 
tom of  the  present  world  conflict,  are  prob- 
lems of  national  economics  which  concern 
the  industrial,  commercial,  and  financial 
status  of  the  Great  Powers  in  their  struggle 
for  supremacy.  The  present  war  is,  in  fact, 
235 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

a  battle  for  trade,  and  for  the  control  of 
trade  routes.  It  is  primarily  the  Balkan  and 
Near  Eastern  questions  that  have  set  the 
armies  of  Europe  in  motion.  Serbia,  the 
vanguard  of  Slavic  predominance  in  the  Bal- 
kan peninsula,  blocked  the  way  of  the  Aus- 
tro-German  advance  to  Asia  Minor  and  be- 
yond; involving  the  future  mastery  of  the 
Adriatic  and  the  ^gean,  the  ultimate  con- 
trol of  Constantinople,  the  possible  bottling 
up  of  Russia  in  the  Black  Sea,  the  control  of 
the  overland  route  to  the  Persian  Gulf,  and 
in  consequence  the  position  of  the  Austro- 
German  Powers  in  the  Mediterranean  and 
the  Indian  Ocean.  In  the  West  the  grand 
prize  has  been  the  possession  of  the  rich  de- 
posits of  coal  and  iron  of  Belgium  and 
France  for  the  further  development  of  in- 
dustry, and  the  acquisition  by  Germany  of 
better  ports  for  transatlantic  commerce.  In 
Poland  it  has  been  not  only  the  possession 
236 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 
of  mineral  resources  but  of  agricultural  land. 

THE  POSSIBLE  EXPANSION  OF  EMPIRE 

If  all  the  territories  now  occupied  by  the 
Central  Powers  can  be  retained  by  them,  it 
would  mean  the  establishment  of  what  would 
be  the  greatest  continental  and  maritime  em- 
pire that  has  ever  existed;  extending  ulti- 
mately from  the  Baltic  to  the  Persian  Gulf, 
with  positions  of  advantage  on  the  North 
Sea,  the  Channel,  the  Adriatic,  the  JEigean, 
the  Black  Sea,  the  Mediterranean,  and  the 
Arabian  Sea — undoubtedly  making  it,  when 
developed,  the  greatest  sea  power  on  the 
globe. 

I  have  spoken  of  this  combination  as,  in 
effect,  one  vast  continental  and  maritime  em- 
pire; for  in  this  extended  area  there  is  no 
single  political  unit,  or  probable  combina- 
tion of  nominally  separate  States,  that  could 
successfully  resist  a  word  of  command  from 
237 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Berlin.  Whatever  the  form  of  subordina- 
tion might  be,  whether  nominally  allies,  pro- 
tectorates, or  constituent  States  in  an  im- 
perial federation,  the  result  would  be  the 
same.  A  customs  union,  an  interchange  of 
raw  materials  and  finished  products,  a  cen- 
tral fiscal  and  military  control,  and  a  com- 
munity interest  in  the  success  of  industry 
and  commerce  would  bind  together  in  one 
great  economic  organism  about  one  hundred 
and  thirty  millions  of  men,  with  a  military 
strength  of  more  than  ten  millions,  and  a 
navy  that  might  ultimately  surpass  any  now 
existing  in  the  world. 

It  would,  of  course,  be  premature  to  con- 
clude that  this  is  to  be  the  necessary  out- 
come of  the  present  war.  It  might,  of 
course,  have  a  quite  different  issue.  It  might 
result  in  the  permanent  establishment  of 
undisputed  British  supremacy  on  every  sea, 
with  such  subsidiary  sea  rights  for  other 
238 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

Powers  as  the  British  Empire  might  gra- 
ciously be  pleased  to  accord  to  them,  while 
reserving  to  itself  a  monopoly  of  sea-borne 
commerce  and  the  practical  dictation  of 
ocean  freights  to  every  part  of  the  world. 

THE  ALTERNATIVE  OF  WORLD  RIVALRY 

It  is  not  to  the  interest  of  the  American 
people  that  any  imperial  colossus,  either  on 
land  or  sea,  should  bestride  the  world;  and 
certainly  not  that  any  single  military  and 
naval  preponderance  should  prevail.  But 
if  we  were  a  weak  nation,  there  would  be 
for  us  a  danger  almost  as  portentous  in  a 
world-wide  rivalry  of  Powers  equally 
matched,  struggling  to  possess  the  ill  pro- 
tected resources  of  the  less  developed  coun- 
tries, and  to  acquire  control  of  all  open  or 
accessible  markets.  In  that  case,  when  the 
military  conflict  is  ended,  if  it  is  in  fact 
289 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

ever  to  be  brought  to  a  final  termination, 
we  should  be  placed  in  the  position  of  mere 
neutrals,  and  without  the  support  of  allies, 
in  an  unceasing  economic  struggle;  and  we 
have  already  learned  in  the  present  contest 
what  it  means  to  be  a  "neutral,"  when  ac- 
tion and  inaction,  participation  and  ab- 
stention, the  vigorous  assertion  of  our  rights 
and  the  tacit  renunciation  of  them  are  al- 
ternately urged  upon  us  from  opposite  sides. 
There  is,  therefore,  little  prospect  of  our 
being  able  to  maintain  good  relations  and  a 
free  field  of  action,  unless  we  are  strong 
enough,  without  depending  upon  others,  to 
take  a  firm  stand  on  the  principle  that  we 
are  to  enjoy  perfect  equality  with  all  others 
in  the  trade  and  commerce  of  the  world. 

OUR  ADVANTAGE  OF  POSITION 

So  far  as  Europe  in  its  entirety  is  con- 
cerned, we  are,  if  we  could  avail  ourselves  of 
240 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

our  opportunity,  in  a  position  to  secure  our 
rightful  privileges  in  any  circumstances  that 
may  arise ;  but  to  do  so  we  must  be  strong  in 
purpose  and  capable  of  execution.  We  are, 
in  fact,  with  regard  to  Europe  as  a  whole, 
in  much  the  same  position  that  Great  Britain 
has  occupied  with  regard  to  the  Powers  on 
the  continent,  ever  since  Cardinal  Wolsey 
instituted  the  policy,  which  England  has 
since  systematically  pursued,  of  balancing 
the  continental  Powers  against  one  another, 
herself  remaining  free  to  pursue  her  indus- 
try and  commerce,  practically  without  in- 
terruption, while  they  were  contesting  their 
frontiers  and  wasting  their  resources  in  end- 
less wars.  Had  England  not  been  an  island, 
she  could  not  have  accomplished  this.  If 
we  did  not  occupy  a  position  of  relative  isola- 
tion afforded  by  a  vast  and  resourceful  con- 
tinental area,  covering  the  richest  zone  of  the 
western  hemisphere,  we  could  never  dream 
17  241 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

of  maintaining  a  strict  neutrality  between 
the  contestants  of  the  eastern  hemisphere; 
but,  thanks  to  that  geographical  advantage, 
while  accessible  to  the  two  great  oceans  of 
the  world  upon  which  we  front,  we  are  able, 
upon  one  condition,  to  hold  the  balance  of 
power  in  the  world.  That  condition  is  that 
we  must  be  strong,  as  England  has  been 
strong,  upon  the  sea;  and  able,  as  England 
has  been  able,  to  guard  our  coasts  from  for- 
eign invasion. 

THE  ADVANTAGE  OF  OUR  DEMOCRACY 

There  are — and  this  must  be  emphasized 
• — two  important  differences  between  our 
situation  and  that  of  Great  Britain,  both  of 
which  are  to  our  advantage.  England's 
base  is  a  limited  insular  area,  insufficient  for 
its  own  maintenance,  upon  which,  as  a 
foundation  for  her  power,  she  has  built  up 
242 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

an  empire  composed  of  colonies  in  every 
quarter  of  the  globe;  while  our  base  is  the 
clean  sweep  of  a  broad  continent,  contain- 
ing within  it  practically  every  natural  re- 
source, and  sufficient  in  all  respects  to  main- 
tain within  its  limits  a  population  of  un- 
checked growth  and  great  prosperity. 

But  a  still  more  important  difference  is 
that,  although  England  is  a  democracy  so 
far  as  her  own  people  are  concerned,  she  is 
essentially  an  imperial  Power  so  far  as  the 
rest  of  the  w^orld  is  concerned.  And  that 
difference  is  capital  for  her  and  for  us.  It 
is  capital  for  her,  because  it  is  the  imperial 
spirit  that  has  made  her  great,  and  to  the 
chariot  wheels  of  imperial  procedure  her 
destiny  is  bound.  It  is  capital  for  us,  be- 
cause we  are  a  democracy  in  very  truth,  com- 
posed of  States  of  which  even  the  least  is 
equal  in  all  the  attributes  of  independence 
to  the  greatest ;  and  we  have  no  need,  or  rea- 
243 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

son,  or  disposition  to  enter  into  rivalry  with 
imperial  ambitions  in  any  part  of  the  world. 


OUR  POLICY  MARKED  OUT  FOR  US 

Our  international  policy  is,  therefore, 
plainly  marked  out  for  us.  It  is  a  policy 
of  pacific  industrial  and  commercial  develop- 
ment, under  adequate  national  defense.  We 
have  no  acquisitive  inclinations  and  enter- 
tain no  aggressive  designs.  We  desire  to  live 
in  peace  here  in  this  great  land  where  Provi- 
dence has  placed  us;  to  utilize  its  resources, 
and  to  enjoy  the  prosperity  which  our  in- 
dustry and  our  enterprise  may  bring  to  us. 
We  claim  as  our  just  right  freedom  and 
safety  in  our  intercourse  with  friendly  na- 
tions, and  desire  if  possible  to  live  on  terms 
of  friendship  with  them  all.  We  shall  en- 
deavor to  treat  them  all  equally ;  but,  if  they 
wish  to  count  us  among  their  friends,  they 
2U 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

must  treat  us  also  as  an  equal.  If  we  are 
weak,  vacillating,  and  pusillanimous  in  our 
dealings  with  them,  we  shall  not  receive, 
and  shall  not  deserve,  their  respect.  And 
if  it  ever  happens  that  we  seem  to  them  to 
care  more  for  our  ease,  our  wealth,  and  our 
personal  safety  than  for  our  public  interests, 
and  our  right  to  entertain,  and  to  express, 
our  candid  opinions  upon  the  rights  and 
duties  of  the  members  of  the  society  of 
States  and  what  should  constitute  the  law 
of  nations,  then  we  shall  mark  ourselves  as 
their  easy  prey. 

THE   ECONOMIC   CONTEST 

I  have  said  that  the  present  conflict  is  at 
bottom  a  battle  for  trade ;  and  we  see  in  its 
terrific  consequences  what  a  battle  for  trade 
may  mean.  Let  us  not  beguile  ourselves 
with  the  illusion  that,  when  the  military  re- 
245 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

sources  of  the  contestants  are  exhausted,  and 
peace  comes  as  a  consequence  of  the  deple- 
tion of  their  fighting  energies,  this  bat- 
tle is  to  cease.  As  a  military  enterprise,  it 
will  end  when  one  or  the  other  side  per- 
ceives that  it  is  hopeless  to  gain  anything 
further  and  will,  therefore,  be  ready  to  make 
concessions  for  the  sake  of  peace.  It  will 
then  be  necessary  to  pass  through  the  stages 
of  diplomatic  negotiation  leading  to  the 
terms  of  settlement — a  battle  of  preten- 
sions, seductions,  arguments,  and  possibly 
compensations  at  the  expense  of  defenseless 
innocents.  When  the  treaties  are  signed, 
there  will  open  the  battle  for  recuperation — 
the  race  for  quick  preponderance  in  the 
world's  markets. 

If  men  were  reasonable,  there  would  be 

a  united  effort  to  form  compacts  for  just 

rules  of  procedure  and  for  the  maintenance 

of  peace,  and  there  will,  undoubtedly,  be 

246 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

such  efforts;  but  the  spirit  of  Imperialism 
is  essentially  unreasonable,  and  unless  it  is 
extinguished,  there  will  result  merely  a  new 
equation  of  forces,  which  may  have  a  certain 
duration  before  it  is  again  disturbed.  How- 
ever this  may  be,  the  one  certainty  is  that 
the  economic  contest  will  be  resumed,  and 
with  renewed  intensity. 

THE  CONDITIONS  OF  THE  STRUGGLE 

What,  then,  will  be  the  conditions  of  the 
struggle? 

First  of  all,  the  antebellum  trade  rela- 
tions cannot  for  a  generation  or  more  be  en- 
tirely restored.  There  is  nowhere  a  disposi- 
tion to  crown  the  future  peace  with  commer- 
cial treaties  guaranteeing  general  participa- 
tion in  the  benefit  of  most-favored-nation 
provisions.  On  the  contrary,  trade  alliances 
based  on  the  present  military  alliances,  and 
247 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

already  partly  negotiated,  will  take  their 
place.  England,  France,  and  Italy — ^three 
important  maritime  Powers — in  January 
last,  at  a  meeting  in  which  more  than  one 
hundred  and  twenty  chambers  of  commerce 
were  represented,  entered  into  an  alliance 
to  oppose  Austrian  and  German  commerce 
during  the  war  and  after  it  is  ended,  and 
to  promote  their  own  cooperation.  "We 
have  already  completed  a  wall  of  steel 
around  our  foes,"  declared  the  French  Pre- 
mier, M.  Briand,  at  Rome,  on  the  twelfth 
of  February,  in  announcing  the  accession  of 
Italy  to  the  compact  of  the  Entente  Allies 
to  forbid,  under  heavy  penalties,  the  im- 
portation of  any  products  from  Austria  or 
Germany. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  great  organization 

of  German  industries,  the  Hansabund,  was 

at  the  same  time,  after  a  session  participated 

in  by  representatives  of  all  parts  of  Ger- 

248 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

many,  petitioning  the  Imperial  Chancellor 
to  prepare  and  present  to  the  Bundesrat 
a  measure  creating  an  "Economic  General 
Staff"  for  the  purpose  of  directing  and 
controlling  all  German  business,  especially 
imports  and  exports,  after  the  war,  and  to 
have  charge  of  the  transition  of  German  in- 
dustry and  commerce  from  a  war  to  a  peace 
basis,  with  the  purpose  of  controlling  ab- 
solutely all  importations  into  Germany 
after  the  war  is  ended. 


THE  MILITARIZATION  OF  INDUSTRY 

When  we  add  to  this  governmental  direc- 
tion of  commerce  the  central  organization 
and  supervision  of  productive  industry — a 
practice  already  highly  developed  in  Ger- 
many, and  having  a  rapid  evolution  in  other 
belligerent  countries,  even  in  England, 
where  it  is  a  startling  innovation — we  realize 
249. 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

that  both  commerce  and  industry  are  to  be 
"militarized,"  if  one  may  use  such  a  word, 
as  never  before  in  the  history  of  the 
world. 

That  this  means  much  for  efficiency  and 
for  economy  cannot  be  doubted.  Between 
the  mine  from  which  metal  is  extracted,  or 
the  forest  from  which  wood  is  hewn,  and 
the  foreign  port  at  which  the  finished  pro- 
duct of  manufacture  is  finally  delivered  for 
sale,  there  is  to  be  no  waste.  The  laborer 
in  the  mine,  the  attendant  who  brings  the 
ore  to  the  surface,  the  railroad  that  handles 
it,  the  furnace  that  refines  it,  the  factory 
that  receives  it  and  transforms  it  into  an 
article  of  utility,  the  steamship  company  that 
carries  it  across  the  ocean — all  these  are  to 
be  under  a  system  of  direction,  by  which 
they  are  financed  and  their  rates  of  remu- 
neration fixed,  as  exact,  as  rigid,  and  as  au- 
thoritative as  that  of  an  army  engaged  in  a 
250 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

military  campaign  upon  which  may  depend 
the  destiny  of  a  nation. 


THE  OBSTACLES  TO  EUROPE^AN  RECUPERATION 

But  what  can  these  belligerent  countries 
do,  it  may  be  asked,  when  they  have  lost 
great  numbers  of  able-bodied  men,  when 
they  have  used  up  their  available  capital  in 
munitions  of  war,  and  when  they  have  suf- 
fered its  attendant  ravages?  Will  they  not 
be  so  utterly  impoverished  as  to  be  able  to 
produce  nothing,  and  stand  in  dire  need  of 
everything? 

A  little  reflection  will  show  us  how  fan- 
tastic such  expectations  are.  It  is  impos- 
sible to  picture  to  ourselves  that  any  con- 
siderable part  of  Europe,  outside  of  un- 
happy Poland,  will  be  in  a  state  of  utter 
and  permanent  ruin.  After  eighteen 
months  of  war,  with  the  exception  of  Aus- 
251 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

tria,  Germany,  and  Russia,  we  are  assured 
that  the  exports  of  the  belligerents  are 
nearly  normal.  The  customary  channels  of 
distribution  have  changed,  but  the  amount 
of  exportation  has  not  been  so  seriously  af- 
fected as  might  be  supposed.  According  to 
the  figures  published  by  the  Board  of  Trade 
for  the  month  of  January  last,  the  exports 
of  great  Britain  show  an  increase  of  more 
than  $42,000,000.  Among  the  largest  items 
were  cotton  goods  shipped  to  India,  France, 
Egypt,  and  South  and  Central  America. 
French  exports  are  reported  as  nearly  nor- 
mal, and  in  some  products  the  sales  of 
France  abroad  have  increased  by  many  mil- 
lions of  francs. 

THE  QUESTION   OF   FUTURE  MARKETS 

With    Germany    the    case    is    different. 
With  her  merchant  marine  driven  from  the 
252 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

oceans  of  the  world,  both  her  export  and  im- 
port trade,  which  in  1913  amounted  to  more 
than  $4,500,000,000,  has  been  almost  en- 
tirely suppressed.  But  what  is  to  hap- 
pen when,  at  the  conclusion  of  peace,  she 
again  enters  upon  her  task  of  recuperation? 
Thus  far,  her  productive  and  distributive 
agencies,  although  temporarily  reduced  to 
inactivity  so  far  as  world  commerce  is  con- 
cerned, remain  substantially  intact,  and  only 
await  the  opportunity  to  resume  their  opera- 
tions. Her  fixed  capital  remains  for  the 
most  part  unaffected.  Her  circulating  cap- 
ital, particularly  her  gold,  has  been  to  a  con- 
siderable extent  kept  within  her  own  bor- 
ders, and  is  still  in  her  possession,  because 
she  has  not  spent  it  lavishly  abroad.  It  is 
chiefly  the  immediate  product  of  her  human 
energies  that  has  been  expended  in  the  war. 
To  her  credit,  when  liquidation  comes,  will 
stand  the  sums  owing  to  her,  and  still  un- 
253 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

paid,  in  the  form  of  outstanding  balances. 
In  short,  her  debt  is  mainly  to  her  own  peo- 
ple. They  will  be  the  poorer,  and  will,  there- 
fore, have  to  work  the  harder,  with  longer 
hours  and  smaller  rewards;  but  they  are  a 
people  capable  of  extreme  frugality  and 
great  industry. 

Her  productive  personnel  will  have  been 
diminished  by  the  loss  of  human  life,  but 
this  is  not  irreparable;  for  the  Germans  are 
a  fecund  race,  whose  annual  increase 
amounts  to  nearly  a  million  souls,  not  to 
speak  of  the  populations  that  may  be  added 
by  territorial  conquest. 

If  this  augmented  area  should  include  all 
the  territories  at  present  actually  occupied 
by  the  Imperial  armies,  which  the  future 
will  determine,  it  would  not  only  show  an 
immense  increase  of  natural  resources  of 
every  kind,  but,  as  illustrated  by  a  map  re- 
cently published  by  the  Frankfurter  Zei- 
254 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

tung,  would  just  about  double  the  former 
superfices  of  the  German  Empire.  It  is  true 
that  the  loss  of  the  German  colonies,  so  far 
as  mere  area  is  concerned,  would,  if  per- 
manent, more  than  counterbalance  these  ter- 
ritorial accessions;  but  this  would  not  di- 
rectly affect  the  productive  powers  of  the 
Empire. 

The  real  problem  in  the  German  battle 
for  industrial  and  commercial  recuperation 
will  be  to  find  open  markets  for  her  enor- 
mous capacity  of  production.  With  her 
greatest  customer,  Great  Britain,  and  the 
Russian  market  to  which  she  formerly  un- 
der a  favorable  commercial  treaty  furnished 
more  than  half  of  all  Russian  imports,  lost 
to  her,  not  to  mention  the  other  belligerent 
countries  that  may  close  their  ports  to  her, 
where  is  she  to  place  her  surplus  manufac- 
tures? 

But  that  is  not  the  whole  of  the  problem. 
255 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

Her  present  antagonists,  in  their  battle  for 
recuperation,  will  have  heavy  debts  to  pay. 
They  will  be  in  every  open  mart  in  the  world 
her  strenuous  rivals.  And  they  will  enter 
upon  this  competition,  not  only  with  new 
and  greatly  intensified  motives;  they  will 
do  so,  at  least  some  of  them,  with  increased 
efficiency.  "We  have  introduced  scores  of 
millions'  worth  of  automatic  machinery," 
says  an  English  minister,  "which  will  have 
an  enormous  effect  upon  our  industries  when 
the  war  is  over." 


OUR  OWN  ECONOMIC  SITUATION 

Here,  then,  is  what  we,  in  America,  shall 
have  to  face.  And  what  are  our  industrial 
defenses  ? 

It  will  not  do  to  base  our  expectations 
upon  present  conditions,  for  these  are  but 
temporary,  essentially  abnormal,  and  cer- 
256 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

tain  to  change.  Our  present  appearance  of 
industrial  prosperity  is  only  superficial  and 
fundamentally  unreal.  In  the  amount  of 
our  exports  we  are  at  present  leading  the 
world;  but  for  that  there  are  obvious  rea- 
sons. The  first  is  that  there  is  for  the  mo- 
ment an  unusual  market,  because  our  ordi- 
nary competitors  are  engaged  in  military 
operations  which  require  their  main  and  al- 
most exclusive  attention.  The  second  is 
that,  apart  from  our  abundant  crops,  which 
may  not  always  be  so  bountiful,  the  great 
percentage  of  our  exports  is  composed  of 
products  that  will  not  be  wanted  when  peace 
really  comes.  Were  these  causes  not  in 
operation,  we  should,  perhaps,  be  today,  as 
we  were  in  1913,  limiting  our  enterprises  and 
trying  to  provide  for  idle  workmen. 

Not   only   so,   but   our  very   prosperity 
creates  for  us  a  danger.    There  is  no  coun- 
try in  the  world  where  a  sudden,  or  a  pro- 
is  257 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

gressive,  lowering  of  the  standard  of  living 
among  the  people  would  be  such  a  calam- 
ity ;  for  the  reason  that  our  natural  resources 
are  so  great,  and  our  possibilities  of  widely 
diffused  prosperity  are  so  evident,  that  the 
American  people  will  not  gi-acefuUy  submit 
to  privations,  and  the  experience  of  them, 
acting  upon  a  sensitive  and  decisive  temper- 
ament, would  expose  us  to  social  unrest  in 
various  forms. 

Nor  would  our  extraordinary  accumula- 
tion of  gold,  as  a  basis  of  currency,  be  an 
advantage  to  us.  If  there  is  sound  philos- 
ophy in  the  quantitative  theory  of  money 
— ^the  misinterpretation  of  which  has  already 
led  us  very  near  to  the  brink  of  financial 
ruin — ^there  would  soon,  in  adverse  circum- 
stances among  our  people,  be  a  demand  for 
an  expansion  of  the  currency,  based  on  the 
increased  volume  of  the  gold  basis,  which 
would  tend  to  raise  prices  in  this  country 
258 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

at  a  time  when  the  cost  of  American  produc- 
tion, in  comparison  with  low  prices  for  for- 
eign goods  seeking  to  force  themselves  into 
our  market,  would  stifle  new  enterprises,  im- 
peril old  ones,  and  bring  upon  us  a  condi- 
tion of  industrial  stagnation  and  unemploy- 
ment such  as  we  have  never  known. 


THE  MEANING  OF  MILITARIZING   INDUSTRY 

In  this  coming  trade  rivalry  American- 
ism will  be  subjected  to  a  severe  trial.  Are 
we  to  adopt  the  new  economic  policy  of  Im- 
perialism, and  militarize  industry?  More 
and  more  we  see  the  signs  of  a  growing  de- 
pendence upon  governmental  action  in  the 
solution  of  economic  problems.  If  we  lack 
a  merchant  marine,  it  is  said,  we  must 
ask  the  Government  to  build  ships  and  or- 
ganize steamship  lines.  When  something 
goes  wrong  with  the  railroads,  or  when  peo- 
259 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

pie  entertain  a  prejudice  against  them  and 
a  disposition  to  punish  them,  a  cry  is 
raised :  Let  the  Government  own  and  man- 
age the  railroads. 

In  truth,  there  has  been  already  a  growth 
of  governmental  functions  and  activities  in 
the  United  States  far  greater  than  the  av- 
erage citizen  imagines.  It  is  startling  to 
be  assured  that,  in  the  Treasury  Department 
alone,  there  has  been  an  increase  of  nine 
hundred  and  thirty-eight  offices  within  the 
last  two  years;  and  that  in  the  past  four 
years  the  total  number  of  Government  em- 
ployees has  increased  from  384,088  to  482,- 
721.  In  fourteen  presidential  elections  no 
successful  candidate  ever  had  so  large  a  pop- 
ular plurality  as  this  vote  would  give,  and 
only  eight  have  ever  surpassed  it. 

But  the  militarization  of  industry  does 
not  consist  merely  in  our  enlargement  of 
governmental  activity;  it  involves  also  the 
260 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

Government's  right  to  command,  prescribe, 
and  compel.  It  would  not  only  take  from 
every  man  his  right  to  conduct  his  own  busi- 
ness, but  it  would  employ  him  as  its  pas- 
sive instrument  in  carrying  out  its  plans,  as- 
signing him  such  a  place  and  such  a  com- 
pensation as  it  might  see  fit.  And  yet  gov- 
ernments are  only  men ! 

THE   POSSIBILITIES   OF   AMERICAN   INITIATIVE 

In  the  American  economic  system  reliance 
has  been  placed  upon  the  initiative  of  the 
individual,  encouraged  and  protected  by  the 
State.  There  will,  perhaps,  in  the  future, 
be  necessary,  as  a  measure  of  conservation, 
closer  supervision  in  some  particulars  than 
was  demanded  when  the  natural  resources 
of  the  country  offered  to  everyone  a  richer 
and  more  immediate  reward  of  labor  and 
enterprise.  The  regulation  of  industry  can- 
261 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

not  be  wholly  denied  to  Government ;  but  it 
would  be  not  only  revolutionary  but  of 
doubtful  advantage  to  the  community  as  a 
whole  to  substitute  for  individual  initiative 
a  governmental  conduct  of  industry.  Even 
as  respects  efficiency,  we  may  doubt  if  mili- 
tarized industry  would  bring  to  those  en- 
gaged in  it  returns  at  all  comparable  to  the 
well  coordinated  efforts  of  private  initiative. 
The  question  opens  an  interesting  field  of 
discussion  into  which  it  is  impossible  to  enter 
here;  but  the  analogy  between  militarized 
industry  and  slave  labor  on  the  one  hand, 
and  between  individual  initiative  and  free 
labor  on  the  other,  should  be  sufficient  to 
justify  the  probability  that  the  latter,  if  af- 
forded a  fair  opportunity,  would  eventually 
prove  the  more  efficient.  Whatever  may  be 
true  of  a  temporary  emergency,  such  as  a 
great  military  crisis  creates,  in  the  long  run 
the  expectation  of  increased  personal  re- 
262 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

wards  should  prove  a  more  powerful  motive 
to  exertion  than  any  system  of  compulsion 
that  could  be  applied.  The  success  of  the 
American  system,  however,  will  require  that 
the  Government  should  not  depress  and  dis- 
courage the  spirit  of  private  enterprise.  On 
the  contrary,  by  enlightening  it  and  smooth- 
ing its  way  to  success  it  might  evoke  the 
maximum  productive  energies  of  the  nation. 

THE  DANGER   OF   ECONOMIC  MENACE 

Whatever  our  abihty  may  be  to  maintain 
and  render  triumphant  our  American  con- 
ception of  economic  success,  it  is  practically 
certain,  as  all  competent  authorities  admit, 
that,  when  the  European  industrial  strug- 
gle for  recuperation  is  resumed,  there  will 
be  an  unprecedented  attempt  to  unload  for- 
eign products  on  our  shores,  as  well  as  a 
vigorous  rivalry  for  all  foreign  trade. 
263 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

To  meet  this  future  inundation  of  cheap 
wares,  which  if  not  prevented  would  ad- 
versely affect  our  own  industries,  the  enact- 
ment of  certain  "anti-dumping"  laws  has 
been  proposed,  declaring  underselling  to  be 
illegal,  on  the  ground  of  "unfair  competi- 
tion." 

But  if  we  ourselves  intend  anywhere  to 
undersell  anyone  else  in  the  markets  of  the 
world,  how  can  we  consistently  lay  down 
the  principle  that  underselling  is  "unfair 
competition"?  Can  we  maintain  the  prin- 
ciple that  to  lower  the  price  is  to  lose  the 
market?  And  by  what  authority  may  the 
Government  at  Washington  undertake  to 
fix  the  minimum  price  of  commodities  of  for- 
eign origin  that  shall  be  considered  fair?  Is 
the  Government  then  to  determine  prices 
also  in  the  United  States?  But,  if  not,  on 
what  ground  is  discrimination  to  be  justi- 
fied? 

264 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

Such  a  policy  would  not  only  prove  an 
apple  of  discord  in  the  realm  of  valuation 
and  discussion,  but  a  veritable  casus  belli 
in  a  diplomatic  sense;  for,  while  there  is  a 
sovereign  right  to  impose  customs  duties, 
and  this  no  responsible  government  will  dis- 
pute, for  all  exercise  it  in  some  degree,  it 
is  a  different  matter  positively  to  prohibit 
trade  with  a  foreign  country.  It  is  an  act 
of  economic  war,  which  would  not  only  de- 
stroy our  most  important  source  for  the 
raising  of  revenue,  but  involve  us  in  con- 
troversies and  complications  with  countries 
with  which  we  desire  to  deal,  and  expose  us 
to  reprisals  that  would  seriously  damage  our 
export  trade  with  our  best  customers. 

THE  INDUSTRIAL  SITUATION  TO  BE  FACED 

There  is  no  doubt  that,  when  the  present 
belligerents  in  Europe  once  enter  upon  the 
265 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

struggle  for  recuperation,  they  will  lower 
their  prices  to  a  point  that  will  enable  them 
to  find  a  market.  It  will  seem  to  their  gov- 
ernments, and  these  will  urge  upon  the  peo- 
ple as  an  obligation  of  patriotism,  that  the 
lengthening  of  the  laboring  day,  the  accep- 
tance of  smaller  wages,  and  the  reduction  of 
the  profits  of  business,  will  be  necessary  in 
order  to  secure  markets  for  their  goods.  It 
will  be  a  form  of  warfare  less  terrible  than 
that  in  the  trenches,  but  it  will  not  be  without 
its  hardships.  Unless  we  are  prepared  to  en- 
courage the  close  and  loyal  union  of  capital 
and  labor,  by  offering  them  every  reasonable 
form  of  guarantee  and  confidence  for  the  fu- 
ture, and  by  permitting  them  to  work  out,  in 
their  own  way,  the  great  problems  of  world 
competition  under  enlightened  guidance,  we 
shall  share,  perhaps  beyond  the  endurance 
of  our  people,  in  the  dire  consequences  of 
266 


NEW  PERILS  FOR  AMERICANISM 

a  contest  from  which  proper  foresight  might 
wholly  exempt  us. 


THE  OPPORTUNITY  OF  AMERICA 

There  is  an  aspect  of  this  suhject  which 
we  should  not  permit  ourselves  to  overlook. 
We  have  labored  long  and  sincerely  in  our 
international  councils  for  peace,  and  for  the 
organized  means  of  preserving  peace.  Our 
efforts  have  been,  to  a  great  degree,  in  vain. 
There  is  no  just  cause  affecting  the  rights 
of  man  that  has  brought  about  this  terrific 
and  murderous  European  war.  It  has  been 
visited  upon  Europe,  and  upon  the  world, 
by  a  spirit  of  imperial  domination  that  we, 
in  this  American  democracy,  do  not  share. 
Why,  then,  should  our  standard  of  life,  as  a 
free  people,  in  a  resourceful  country,  be 
lowered  to  meet  the  economic  exigencies  of 
267 


AMERICANISM:  WHAT  IT  IS 

those  whose  rulers  have  inflicted  this  curse 
upon  mankind?  If  men  would  be  governed 
by  reason,  respect  one  another's  rights,  and 
live  in  peace,  there  would  be  an  abundance 
for  all.  Let  us  prove,  therefore,  that  De- 
mocracy can  perform  what  Imperialism  has 
failed  to  accomplish;  that  a  well  ordered 
government,  based  on  the  rights  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  supported  by  the  sense  of  duty  of 
the  people,  is  able  not  only  to  maintain  its 
existence  in  the  midst  of  discordant  nations, 
but  to  realize  its  own  ideals  of  human  happi- 
ness, and  become  an  example  and  an  in- 
spiration for  the  progress  of  mankind. 


INDEX 


Absolute    democracy,    dif- 
fers   little    from    im- 
perialism, 130-131 
illogical,  128-129 
Absolutism,  destruction  of, 
27 
of  Democracy,  35-36 
renounced  by  people,  55- 
56,  66-67 
"Agreement  of  the  People" 

of  1647,  14 
Alliances  for  war,  for  trade, 
247-249 
we  shall  not  enter  into, 
222 
America  First,  191 
America,    opportunity    of, 

267-268 
American  attitude  towards 
rights  and  liberties,  tra- 
ditional, 186-188 
American  conception  of  the 
State,  essential  elements 
in,  41-42 
American  Democracy,  test 
of,  125-128,  133,  146- 
148,  153-154,  234 
American  doctrine,  the  dis- 
tinctive, 22-26 


American  example,  impor- 
tance of,  to  the  world, 
39-41 

American  initiative,  possi- 
biUties  of,  261-263 

American  interests,  our  spe- 
cial, 219-221 

American  people  will  not 
submit  to  privations, 
258 

American  republics,  claims 
upon,  220,  222 
exploitation  of,  219 

Anarchy,  suppression  of, 
152-153 

Arbitration,  international, 
196 

Aristotle  on  influence  of 
demagog,  57-59 

Armament,  burden  of,  196 

Armed  force,  prerogative  of 
Sovereign  State,  8-9 

Austro-German  struggle  for 
supremacy  in  near  East, 
236-238 

Authority,  public,  true  na- 
ture of,  103-104 
rightful,  and  supreme  pow- 
er identified,  12-13 


INDEX 


Automatic  machinery,  ef- 
fect of,  on  industry,  256 

Balance  of  power  in  govern- 
ment, encroachments 
on,  62-64 

Balance  of  power  in  the 
world,  we  may  hold, 
242 

Balkan  question,  relation 
of,  to  present  war, 
236 

Briand,  M.,  on  foes  of  allies, 
248 

British  Empire.  See  Great 
Britain 

Burke,  Edmund,  on  Ameri- 
can example,  39 
on  oppression  of  minority 
by  majority,  131-132 

Capital,  German,  kept  with- 
in borders,  253-254 
and  labor,  union  of,  to  be 
encouraged,  266 
Central    Powers,    possible 
continental  and  mari- 
time expansion  of,  237- 
238 
Chatham,  Lord.     See  Pitt, 

Wm. 
Citizen,  a  constituent  of  the 
State,  133-134 
has  no  rights  under  sov- 
ereign power,  12-13 
Citizen  -  defenders,  trained 
body  of,  224-225 


Citizens,  State  must  pro- 
tect, 199-203,  213 
Civil  and  reUgious  interests, 

separation  of,  30-32 
Civil  War,  severest  test  of 

constitutionahsm,  49 
Class  antagonism,  73 
Class  control,  71-74 
Coal  deposits  of  France  and 
Belgium  a  war  prize, 
236 
Colonists,    American,    con- 
ception of  government 
of,  17-23,  25-28 
Coromerce,    right    to    free 

passage  of,  188,  222 
Competition,  unfair,  264 
Constitution,  a,  of  civiliza- 
tion, 169 
the  conscience  of  a  State, 
138 
Constitution,   the,    attacks 
upon,  74-75, 116, 147 
founded  on  the  New- 
tonian theory,  87- 
88 
opposition    to,    95-98, 
117-119 
not  a  class  guaran- 
tee, 110-113 
proposed    changes    in, 

59-61 
protection     of    States 
guaranteed  in,  200 
real  significance  of,  32- 

34 
respected,  70 


270 


INDEX 


Constitutional  Democracy, 
foundation  of,  human 
personality,  129 
recognizes  rights  of  na- 
tions, 166-168 
Constitutional  government, 
basic  principles  of,  51 
cause  of  failures  in,  68-69 
preservation  of,  79 
Constitutional    guarantees, 
hostility  to,  34-36 
organization  for   conser- 
vation of,  81-82 
value  of,  113-115 
Constitutional    limitations, 
encroachments     upon, 
62-65 
Constitutionalism,   dangers 
to,  71-73,  77 
friends  and  enemies  of, 
50-53 
Constitutions,  problems  of 
framers  of,  103-104 
the  first  written,  29 
Corporate  properties,  valu- 
ation of,  106,  113 
Court  nullification  of  legis- 
lation, 107 
Courts  instituted  to  main- 
tain Constitution,  28 
Currency,  dangers  of  expan- 
sion of,  258-259 
Customs  duties,  right  to  im- 
pose, 265 


Danger,  unrecognized  source 
of,  214-217 


Darwin,  government  com- 
pared with  theories  of, 
88-91 
Declaration  of  Rights, 

Mass.,  22 
Defense,     economic     argu- 
ments against,  205-206 
first  Une  of,  217-219 
internal  development  un- 
der adequate,  244 
pacifist    antagonism    to, 

209-210 
question  of  national,  195, 

197-200 
young  men  and  national, 
224r-226 
Defenses,     our    industrial, 

256-259 
Demagogism,    constitution 

a  bar  to,  56-59 
Democracy,  advantages  of 
our   own,    over   Great 
Britain,  242-244 
and  demagogism,  57-59 
conflict  with  imperialism, 

139-141 
incompatible  with  impe- 

riaUsm,  181-183 
responsibiUty  in  a  true, 

133-134 
superiority  of,  over  im- 
perialism, 127 
test  of,  as  a  theory,  127- 

129 
test  of  our  own,  153-154 
triumph  of,  154^156 


271 


INDEX 


Democracy  versus  imperial- 
ism, 134-135,  268 
weak  points  in,  144-148 

Democratic  ideal,  the,  151- 
153 

Diplomacy  our  first  line  of 
defense,  217-219 

Diplomatic  crises,  alterna- 
tives in,  215 

Disraeli,  protagonist  of  Im- 
perialism, 150 

Economic  contest,  the,  at 
close  of  war,  245-247, 
266 
struggle    for    supremacy 
in,  247-249 

Economic  General  Staff  to 
control  German  busi- 
ness, 249 

Economic  menace  of  foreign 
wares,  263-265 

Economic  situation,  our 
own,  256-259,  261-263 

Economic  thinking,  domi- 
nance of,  204-207 

Economics,  problems  of  na- 
tional, 235 

Efficiency  under  militarized 
industry,  250,  262 

Empire,  of  Central  Powers, 

possible  expansion  of, 

237-238 

of  Great  Britain,  possible 

supremacy  of,  238-239 

Elmpires,  alliances  of,  and 
republics,  182-183 


Empires  do  not  federate,  142 

Employers  have  no  right  to 
exist,  106,  112-113 

England,  advantages  of  in- 
sular situation  of,  241, 
242-243 

English  Revolution  of  1688, 
17-18 

Entente  AUies,  trade  com- 
pact of,  248 

Equahty,  means  of  guaran- 
teeing, 53-56 

Europe  reaching  out  for 
world  dominion,  219 

European  question  in  Mex- 
ico, 220 

European  recuperation,  ob- 
stacles to,  251-252 

Executive,  powers  of  the, 
54-55 
prerogatives  of  the,  63-64 

Experiment,  substitution  of, 
for  experience,  90-92 

Exports,  American,  257 
of  belligerents,  252-255 

Federation  of  nations  does 
not  involve  national  ex- 
tinction, 168 

Force,  armed,  relation  of 
peace  to,  185-186 

Foreign  policy,  need  of  a 
clear,  221-223 

France,  exports  of,  252 

Geographic  isolation,  our, 
abolished,  218 


«7« 


INDEX 


Geographical  position,  ad- 
vantages of  our,  240- 
241 
Germany,  export  and  im- 
port trade  of,  252-253 
industrial  control  in,  249 
world's  markets  closed  to, 
255 
Gladstone,    protagonist    of 

Democracy,  150-151 
Gold,    effect   of   extraordi- 
nary accumulation  of, 
258-259 
Government,  a  just,  essen- 
tially   self  -  limiting 
138-139 
should    exist    for    the 
governed,  175-176 
all  just,  based  on  recog- 
nition of  individual 
rights  and  liberties, 
15,18 
biological  analogy  on,  88- 

91 
ill-considered  proposals  of 

change  in,  36-39 
obUgation  of,  to  protect 

citizens,  198-203 
of  laws  not  men,  30 
price  regulation  by,  264 
real  problem  of,  129-132 
there  should  be  nothing 
in,  not  governed  by 
law,  27 
Government  employees,  in- 
crease in,  260 


Government  ownership,dan- 

gers  of,  259-263 
Governmental  direction  of 

commerce,  249 
Great  Britain,  an  imperial 
power,  242-243 
conflict    of    imperiaUsm 
and    democracy    in, 
149-151,  155 
exports  of,  252 
poUcy  of,  toward  conti- 
nental powers,  241 
undisputed  supremacy  of, 
possible  outcome  of 
war,  238-239 
Guarantees,  constitutional, 
hostility  to,  34-36 
value  of,  113-115 
for  equal  rights,  61-56 

Hague,  The,  international 
conferences  at,  164, 177 

Hansabund,  the,  organiza- 
tion of  German  indus- 
tries, 248-249 

Heritage,  the  American,  45 

Holy  Alliance,  protest  to 
the,  188 

Huerta  government,  obliga- 
tions of  the,  220-221 

Ideals,  necessity  of  national, 
226-228 

Imitators  of  American  sys- 
tem, 40-41 

Imperial  armies,  area  oc- 
cupied by  the,  254-255 


19 


273 


INDEX 


Imperial  domination,  spirit 

of,  cause  of  war,  267 
Imperialism,  an  aggressive 
principle  in  worid  poli- 
tics, 179 
and    international    law, 

161-166 
conflict  of,  with  democ- 
racy, 139-141 
contrasted   with   democ- 
racy, 134-135 
incompatibihty    of,    and 
democracy,   181-183 
in   Great   Britain,    149- 

151,  155 
om*  own  relation  to,  148- 

149,  153,  156 
result  of  absolute  democ- 
racy is,  130-131 
strength  of,  142-145 
the  State  a  superior  en- 
tity under,  3 
unreasonable,  247 
Income  tax,  60-61 
Individual,  danger  to  the, 
under        irresponsible 
power,  114 
initiative  of  the,  in  in- 
dustry, 261-263 
no  authority  can  deprive 
the,      of      inherent 
rights,  104 
relation  of,  to  State,  4-5 
subordinated  to  State,  67 
the,  and  wealth,  99-100 
needs  self-dependence, 
119-120 


Individuals  constitute  the 
whole  of  the  State,  19 

Industrial  situation  to  be 
faced,  265-267 

Industry,  analogy  between 
militarized,  and  slave 
labor,  262 
meaning  of  mihtarizing, 

259-261 
militarization  of,  249-251 

Inliabitants  of  conquered 
territory,  fate  of,  9-10 

Inheritance,  right  of,  ques- 
tioned, 97,  105 

International  intercourse, 
laws  of,  unsettled,  234 

International   law,   Ameri- 
can   attitude    toward, 
187-188,  223 
foundations   of,    shaken, 

171 
real  basis  of,  161-164 

International  poUce  force, 
196 

International  problem,  the 
present,  223-224 

International  situation,  the, 
233-235 

Iron  deposits  of  France  and 
Belgium  a  war  prize,  236 

Judicial  authority  distinct- 
ive feature  of  American 
conception,  40 

Judicial  settlement  of  in- 
ternational differences, 
177 


274 


INDEX 


Judiciary,  functions  of  the, 
55,65 
respect    for    the,    main- 
tained, 70-71 
Jural  society  an  association 

of  equals,  165-166 
Justice,   international,   our 
poUcy  toward,  222 
relation  of,  to  peace,  183- 

184 
universal,    necessary    to 
peace,  198,  209 

King  and  Parliament  mere- 
ly institutions  of  the 
State,  19 

KipHng,  the  law  of  the  jun- 
gle, 143-144 

Law,  diminished  respect  for, 

75-76 

equality    of,     does    not 

make     equaUty     of 

condition,  98 

essential  permanence  of, 

^  89-90 
fruits  of  government  by, 

70-71 
fundamental,  basis  of  so- 
cial justice,  93-96 
spirit  of  revolt  against, 
115-117 
principles    of,    behttled, 

87 
self-imposed,  voluntary 
submission  to,  15 


Law,  sovereignty  the  source 
of  and  above,  11-12 
the,  defined,  103 
Laws  of  equalization,  98, 112 
League   to   enforce   peace, 

180-181 
Legislation,   and   taxation, 
distinction       between, 
necessary  to  hberty,  25 
by  minorities,  137 
new,   nature   of,   as  de- 
manded, 104-108 
radical,  97-98 
unconstitutional   en- 
croachments on,  64- 
65 
Legislative  bodies,  restric- 
tions on,  54,  64 
Lincoln,  Pres.,  on  weakness 

of  repubUcs,  155 
Locke,  John,  philosophy  of, 

familiar  to  many,  18 
Louis  Napoleon,  American 
protest  to,  against  in- 
vasion of  Mexico,  188- 
189 

Magna  Charta,  limitations 
of,  22 
personal    guarantees    in, 
17,  26 
Majorities,   danger  of  un- 
limited power  in  hands 
of,  95 
renunciation  of  absolute 

power  of,  40 
tyranny  of,  36,  203 


275 


INDEX 


Majority,  Burke  on  oppres- 
sion of  minority  by  the, 
131-132 
legislation  by  the,  128 
will    of    the,    authority, 
74 
Majority  absolutism,   irre- 
sponsibility of,  135-138 
Markets,  question  of  future, 

252-256 
Massachusetts,    separation 
and     distribution     of 
powers  in,  29-30 
Massachusetts  Constitution 
of  1780,  end  of  govern- 
ment asserted  in,  21- 
22 
Mayflower,  compact  of  the, 
first     protest     against 
mere  power,  14-15 
Mexico,  anarchy  in,  153 
causes  of  disorder  in,  69, 

75 
European    question    in, 
220 
Militarism,  fear  of,  189-191 
repugnance    to    develop- 
ment of,  173 
Minority,  oppression  of,  by 
majority,  131,  136-138 
Montesquieu,  separation 
and     distribution     of 
powers  adopted  from, 
29 
Morality,  private  and  pub- 
He,  7-8 
State  not  governed  by,  7 


Nation,  duty  of  the,  to  the 
future,  228-230 

National  security,  present 
basis  of,  171-173 

National  strength,  neces- 
sity of,  174-175 

Near  Eastern  question  and 
the  present  war,  236 

Neutral,  what  it  means  to 
be,  240 

Newton  and  Darwin,  gov- 
ernment compared  with 
theories  of,  88-91 

Obligation,  our  primary  na- 
tional, 198-201 

Organization  of  industry, 
central,  249 

Pacifism,  effects  of  poHtical, 
209-211 
influence  of,  207-209 
Parliament,  right  of,  to  leg- 
islate for  and  tax  col- 
onies, 25 
Parliament    of    man    only 
reahzable  through  de- 
mocracy, 156 
Patriotism,  economic  obU- 
gation  of,  266 
influence  of  an  enhght- 
ened,  191 
Peace,  armed  defense  to  se- 
cure, 180-181 
concessions  for  the  sake 
of,  246 


276 


INDEX 


Peace,  precedence  of,  over 
honor,  214 
relation  of,  to  force,  185- 
186 
American      attitude 
toward,  186^188 
to  justice,  183-185 
through  justice,  198,  209, 
221,  222 
People,  every,  should  main- 
tain  its   own   govern- 
ment, 152 
Philanthropy,   radical  pro- 
posals    mask     under, 
109-110 
Philippines,  the,  American 

attitude  toward,  177 
Pilgrims,  compact  of  gov- 
ernment   of    the,    14- 
15 
political    inheritance    of 
the,  17-19 
Pitt,  Wm.,  on  America,  39 
on  the  Stamp  Act,  24-25 
Platform  of  world  poUtics, 

176 
PoUcy,  our  foreign,  221-223 
our    international,    244r- 
245 
Pohtical  theory,  American 
contribution  to,  27-28 
Politics,  fruits  of  the  new, 

201-204 
Power,  absolute,  of  govern- 
ing authority,  11-12 
of       majorities,       re- 
nounced, 40 


Power,    American    protest 
against  mere,  13-15 
arbitrary,      renunciation 
of,  by  people,  29-30, 
66-67,  71 
results  of  failure  to  re- 
nounce, 67-69 
dangers  of  irresponsible, 
within  State,  113-1 15, 
self-limitation    of,    foun- 
dation of  democracy, 
133 

Powers,    encroachment   on 
balance  of,  62-65 
legislative,    judicial    and 
executive,  separation 
of,  30 
Powers  of  Europe,  alliance 
of     three      important 
maritime,  248 
balance  of  the,  241 
conflict  of  the,  for  trade 
supremacy,  235-236 
gigantic  struggle  of  the 

Great,  233-234 
rivalry  of  the,  a  danger  to 
America,  239-240 
Preamble  to  Constitution, 
provision    for    defense 
in,  199 
Preparation  for  defense  of 
free   institutions,    173, 
190-191,  234 
arguments   against  mili- 
tary, 205 
President,  the,  prerogatives 
of,  63-64 


277 


INDEX 


President,  tour  of,  for  pre- 
paredness, 214 
Prestige,   loss  of  national, 

211-214 
Prince,  will  of  the,  law,  100- 

101,  134 
Principle    of    equality    of 

trade,  239 
Principles,  American  plat- 
form of,  175-177 
of  right  embodied  in  self- 
government,  28 
opposition  to  American, 

177-179 
revolt  against  fixed,  BO- 
SS, 126 
versus  personalities,  78- 
79 
Propaganda,  radical,  116 

pacifist,  207-208 
Property,    distribution    of 
private,  100-103 
exemption     of     private, 

from  capture,  177 
rightful  ownership  of,  104 
Property  class  and  Consti- 
tution, 105,  110-111 
Prosperity,  danger  in  our 
present,  257-259 

Reason  versus  emotion,  92- 

95 
appeal  to,  170 
Recuperation,  struggle  for, 

251,  255,  265 
Religion,    separated    from 

state,  31-32 


Republics,  alliances  of,  with 

empires,  182-183 
Resources,        insufficiently 

protected,  233 
Revolt,    spirit   of,    against 

law,  115-117 
-Rights,  American,  our  gov- 
ernment has  defended, 
188-189 
as  the   gifts  of  society, 

100-103 
equal,   establishment  of, 
among  nations,  223 
human,  distinctive  Amer- 
ican doctrine  of,  22- 
23,  126,  202 
inalienable,  a  wrong  con- 
ception of,  106 
government   must   re- 
spect, 129-130 
individual,  guaranteed  in 
Constitution,  33-34, 
86 
just  government  based 

on,  15,  18,  51-55 
not  to  be  surrendered, 

20 
salvation    of    pohtical 
future,  80 
national,     existence     of, 

164-169 
natural,  none  under  ab- 
solute     democracy, 
127-128 
of   citizens,    State   must 
protect,  199-203, 234 


278 


INDEX 


Rights,  of  man  not  cause  of 
present  war,  267 
of  peoples  respected  only 
when  defended,  178 
of  States,  foundation  of 
international       law, 
162-163 
Rights   and   hberties,    cer-^ 
tain,      never     to     be 
abridged,  26 
State  should  preserve,  21 
Rousseau,  doctrine  of,  not 

accepted,  33 
Ruler,  all  rights  centered  in, 
100-102 
compulsory  obedience  to, 
10 

Senators,   popular  election 

of,  60 
Serbia  blocked  Austro-Ger- 

man  advance,  236 
Social  forces,  drift  of,  75-78 
Social  justice,  law  basis  of, 

true,  93 
new  conception  of,  98 
Social   progress,   American 

interest  in,  227 
Social  reforms,  accompUsh- 

ment  of,  110 
Society,  never  achieved  any 

industrial  activity,  99 
rights  as  gifts  of,  100,  112 
Sovereign  people,  abuse  of 

rights  of,  101-103 
renounce  absolutism,  55, 


Sovereign  State,  and  armed 
force,  8-9 
international  law  would 
limit,  164 
Sovereign  States,  society  of, 

164 
Sovereignty,  essential  lim- 
its of,  19-22 
not  unlimited  authority, 

127,  130 
of  States  in  international 
deaUngs,    165  - 166, 
169 
self-limiting,  or  imperial- 
ism, 139 
supreme  power,  11 
Stamp  Act  of  1765,  Pitt  on, 

24-25 
Standard  of  living,  lowering 

of,  a  calamity,  258 
State,  the,  alleged  immuni- 
ties of,  6-9 
defined,  3 

duty  of,  to  protect  citi- 
zens, 199-200 
essential      elements      in 
American  conception 
of,  41-42 
new  conception  of,  16-19 
predatory  beginnings  of, 

9-10 
preeminence  of,  4-6 
purpose  of,  protection  of 
individual  rights  and 
liberties,  23 
reasons  for  irresponsibil- 
ity of,  10-13 


279 


INDEX 


State,  subject  to  its  own 
fundamental  law,  103- 
104 
true    nature    of,    deter- 
mined by  its  end,  21- 
22 
unlimit-ed    authority    of, 
under     imperialism, 
164 
Statesmanship,  need  of,  233 
Struggle  for  economic  su- 
premacy, 247-249 

Taxation  of  American  col- 
onies, 24-25 
Trade,  equality  with  all  in, 
240 
prohibition  of,  with  for- 
eign country,  act  of 
war,  265 
world  conflict  for,  235- 
237,  245-246 
Trade   alUances   based   on 
miUtary  alhances,  247- 
249 
Treasury  Department,   in- 
crease of  ofl[ices  in,  260 
Treaties,   arbitration,   209, 
210 
no  security  against  vio- 
lence, 171 
Tribute,  payment  of,  to  con- 
queror, 10 

Violence,  suppression  of,  in- 
ternational problem, 
223 


Wage-earners  need  consti- 
tutional      guarantees, 
111-112 
War,  peace-loving  country 
not  secure  from,  172 
political   pacifism   afraid 

of,  212-213 
possible  outcome  of  pres- 
ent, 237-239 
propositions  for  avoiding, 
195-196 
Wealth,  limitation  of,  97 
new  theory  of,  99-100 
Wolsey,  Cardinal,  institut- 
ed balance  of  power, 
241 
Workers,  remuneration  of, 

106,  112 
World  organization,  Amer- 
ican union  an  example 
for,  42 
democracy  or  imperialism 
in,  140-142,  156-157 
obstacles  to,  43-45,  169- 

171 
possibihty  of,  167-169 
World-power,  this  country 

as  a,  214,  218 
World   rivalry,   alternative 

of,  239-240 
World's  markets,  race  for 
preponderance  in,  246 

Young  men,  attitude  of  our, 
224-226 
meaning  of  our  country 
to  the,  229-230 


280 


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